A Poisoning In The ImaginAIRium : Han Lee, Sean Tyrrell, Michael Hartnett: Belladonna In The Bar

Han Lee did the drawings. Feel woosey? The medium is the massage….

Han Lee’s Illustration of Bard Sean Tyrrell’s musical adaptation of Michael Hartnett’s Poem. Bard Tyrrell is legendary for his lyrical adaptations of the Irish Literary Giants.
BELLADONNA IN THE BAR                                                                                                             She sits, and spins, and makes no wool,
ovaries empty, belly full,
and all the pubby amber day
she waits for some be-lagered prey.

Her eyes, above her borrowed drink,
the hue of octopus’s ink,
regard me with baleful gaze.

She hopes an alcoholic haze
will open pocket, loosen tongue,
and when the information’s wrung
she’ll take the words and change them- quite
and embellish them with spite,

And envy’s rictus clamps her groin
as she sees each silvery coin,
each single five- and ten pound note
slide, destined for another’s throat,
across the counter for a drink-
she must replot, rescheme, rethink.

This mistress of stiletto-stabs
lets malice fall in dribs and drabs,
and when she drinks with friends of mine,
a little poison in their wine
makes women cautious, men suspect
that I’m the High Priest of her sect,
that all my moves are slyly planned,
that rumor is my magic wand”
that my end is exploitation,
that I, not she, will rob the nation.

So come you lushes, drinkers, topers,
be you residents or interlopers,
sail you on yachts or dhows or junks,
be you Sunday” or weekday-drunks-
beware this black and midnight hag
with venom in her shopping bag.