Prosa

Waterproof (Patrick Chalmer 1931)


(The Curly Coated Retriever)

His brown is so spacious
He looks so sagacious,
The very owdacious
Old workman is he,
And out late and early,
A black dog and burly,
And coated as curly
As corkscrews can be;

When scent is all tricky,
When cover is thick, he
Can pick any dicky-
Bird, titled as game,
That you, Sir, can slaughter;
But it’s in cold water
(His wig twisted tauter)
That most he wins fame;

Since to curls unmonastic
But closely elastic
No weather’s too dramatic,
His clusters are none
That rainstorms can raggle
Or haggle or draggle,
Agog for the gaggle,
He sits by the Gun;

And let tides as they will race,
Away like a mill-race,
Shall your game, in their chill race,
Go out on the floods?
Nay, a dog, black and curly,
With curls that are twirly,
Bobs back through the hurly –
Green water, white suds;

With a goose that is big and
A shake of his wig (and
The diamond drops jig and
Jump off him like rain,
The pearly drops glisten)
He’s landed, “Here’s this ‘un,”
Says he, “Now, let’s listen
For gaggles again.”

Down he sits, oh, let none err,
The dog that’s the one-er
To wait, with the gunner,
The fowl off the sea-
A black dog, a hurly,
Whose black coat is pearly
With raindrops and curly
As corkscrew can be!

From Gundogs by Patrick Chalmers (1931)