Captain Billy's Whiz Bang #3 — page 34: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page announces a monthly poetry contest for amateur "Kiplings" (aspiring poets), with the winning "sob song" titled "Chicken Fever" by Field Ashworth. The poem is a humorous drunk narrative: the speaker has consumed cheap alcohol ("the stuff they sold to me"), experiences hallucinations (pink elephants), loses his girlfriend to someone named Jack, and ends with an interrupting phone call. The repeated "Broke, broke, broke" refrain emphasizes financial and moral dissolution. The satire targets two things: the pretensions of amateur poetry contests, and the comedic portrayal of working-class drunkenness—a common Whiz Bang theme. The "sob song" format mimics sentimental popular music while celebrating crude, bawdy humor instead. It's gentle mockery of both poetry aspiration and modern urban dissipation.