Poetry o' hops

Today Slate posted an article on how the craft beer movement needs to calm down on the hops, already.  One line from the article said that hops enthusiasts "wax poetic" about the bitter little blooms, so I challenged some beer-loving friends to a poetry slam over e-mail.  Here's what we came up with.

Tom's iambic pentameter verse:

When I do taste a hops that rapes my face,

The flow of tears: one bitter, one joyful.

My haiku:

I inhale the scent

Of freshly cut juniper, 

Then taste: NO NO NO

My limerick:

Dave and I brew beer,

Yet hops I still do fear.

   They hurt my palate,

   But Dave writes ballads

And keeps a 90-minute near.

[Reference: Dogfish Head 90-minute IPA]

Tom's limerick:

I once drank a beer from Aurora,

Jam-packed with indigenous flora.

   More drinks I demanded

   Of sweet Heavy Handed,

Until carried home by Laura.

[Reference: Two Brothers Heavy Handed]

Dave's SONNET:


I wish I could but speak to him, myself
At one-and-twenty: "Listen not to lies
Of 'triple-hops' that sit upon that shelf:
Subsist no longer on water and rice!

Take this instead: a pale ale, more or less -
No ‘smoothness’ here, no ‘drinkability’ -
But what is sweetness without bitterness?
Or craft without thought; complexity?

But sip them slow, these citrus notes of spring,
Proud songs of green grasses and summer sun.
For these!  Not delicate nor forgiving,
Assault the palate; numb the novice tongue."

Much else we'd say as we two quenched our thirst,
But that would wait, for love for hops comes first.