I know that what I do here at Angelsportion is principally devoted to whisky. Ah, ’tis true. And yet, if you a have moment, if you aren’t too busy, if you are in need of more whimsical fare, I would encourage you to enjoy a swift outing through the poetry I’ve included here and there. You’ll find numerous elegies born of varying causes, one or two of which are bound to make you smile.

With that, having urged you into the poetical sphere, tell me, are you familiar with Shel Silverstein? The Giving Tree. Where the Sidewalk Ends. Falling Up. Good stuff. Essentials for any library, including that of an adult. Along with Dickinson, and Poe, and Twain, I most certainly claim him as sort of a subterranean influence. I was the seedling. He was the soil. I was planted into his style as a young boy, and with this, he helped to cultivate the way I look at words and their places in a sentence. He helped to nourish me with the understanding that poetry need not always be so profoundly cavernous that its goal is lost to cumbersome hermeneutics. He “learned” me to the poetically improper and, sometimes, just how fun the wrong words in the right order could be. He proved that with the simplest one-syllable words used by the youngest among us, the poet can often articulate with a handful of sentences what others can only wish to produce in a handful of volumes. Silverstein delivers a lot from only a little, and he does so brilliantly.

This brings me to the Tobermory 10-year-old edition.

It is simple, relatively inexpensive, not very imposing in stature, and effortlessly lost amongst a briny sea of single malts crowding the shelves of your favorite liquor store. And yet, while it appears little among the greats, it gives much.

The aroma sing-songs through with singed but sweetened malt. The palate agrees and adds to the cadence, sending along a lively parade of dried apple slices given a light sugar dusting and a kiss of peat. The finish is medium, tapping through the previous paces and then setting the whole crew down into a sward near a stack of freshly cut oak.

Yes, all of this from something so… simple. It’s enough to keep the “Sharp Toothed Snail” at bay, actually change “Mr. Moody’s” demeanor, and convince a tree that becoming a whisky cask would be the best way to show her love for a man who was once her favorite boy.

Now, accepting the risk, here’s a taste of what you will discover if you accept my offer to peruse the available poetry. I’m setting the following before you not just because it is a personal favorite that was stirred in a memorable moment, but because it is brief — a quick spin and its done — and because it’s easily digestible.

I hope you will enjoy it. Be sure to let me know if you do.

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My little girl has pencils
Of green and red and blue.
She’ll make those dandy ‘tensils
Perform a dance for you.

And if you’re blessed enough to see
The trees and sky and open sea,
You’ll dance a little dance with me
Just ‘cause you saw them, too!
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