Apr. 05, 2004 - 4:59 p.m.

I'm A Poet, And I Didn't Know That I Was

April is National Poetry Month!

I hate poetry.

Actually, let me ammend that:

I hate stupid poetry.

Which basically is any poem that doesn't have the word "Nantuckett" in it.

I think most poetry annoys the shit out of me because it has devolved into Prose. Short prose written in staggered lines filled with too many adverbs and idiotic metaphores. If the author didn't explicitly label his work as a poem somehow, people would think he was a prepubescent foreign exchange student not versed in rudimentary English.

Here, look:

I think most

Poetry annoys the

Shit

Out of me.

Because it

HAS

Devolved into Prose.

Short prose.

Written in

Staggered lines filled

You get the idea. Try it. Write an overblown bit of purple prose that you wouldn't hand to your 3rd grade Special Ed teacher. Make it about some inner emotion only you can pretend to really appreciate. Now close your eyes and pencil hash marks at random on the page. Make each hash mark a line break (the end of a line). Copy the words to a new sheet of paper, ending each line where there is a hash mark.

Voila! You're Willaim Carlos Williams!

(I jest? Here, read this passage from his "To A Friend Concerning Several Ladies":

"And they are right. There is no good in the world except out of a woman and certain woman alone for certain. But what if I arrive like a turtle, with my house on my back or a fish ogling from under water? It will not do. I must be steaming with love, colored like a flamingo. For what? To have legs and a silly head and to smell, pah! like a flamingo that soils it's own feathers behind."

Of course, he wrote it like this:

And they are right. There is

no good in the world except out of

a woman and certain women alone

for certain. But what if

I arrive like a turtle,

with my house on my back or

a fish ogling from under water?

It will not do. I must be

steaming with love, colored

like a flamingo. For what?

To have legs and a silly head

and to smell, pah! like a flamingo

that soils its own feathers behind.

Brilliant, huh? Nothing like bird shit analogies to really get the critics fawning. I think it's telling that his next line was: "Must I go home filled with a bad poem?"

Or rather:

Must I go home filled

with a bad poem?

Yes, apparently he must.)

So anyway, I wrote a poem.

A real poem.

My buddy Mike, upon becomming engaged, decided to bulk up for the Big Event. Not by lifting weights, but by lifting beers. And anything else that wouldn't stretch his esophogus to the tearing point.

Maybe he was trying to see if his betrothed really loved the INNER him, and not just his $8/hour Radio Shack assistant manager's salary. Whatever the motive, he was successful. Between his initial tux fitting and the wedding day he had to have his suit pants let out three times. His neck was thicker than my thigh. (Mike and Co. are also devoutly religous, although I try not to hold it against them.)

For a wedding present, rather than cash (which would only be sunk into several dozen canolli by week's end, I'm sure), I penned this heartfelt opus, and had it nicely framed:

(I wrote it in his bride's voice)

My Biggest Love

Would Gluttony were no great sin!

So plaudits heaped upon the thin

Could stretch beyond their sallow skin.

And Heaven's gate could open wide

To let even you, my Love, inside.

.

But rules He mad we're bound to keep,

So next to you I vow I'll sleep.

'Tho it worries me that as your wife

I'll have to use the Jaws of Life

To extricate you from your Jeep.

.

Some say your life will end in fire,

Some say ice.

From what I've seen of your desire

For tacos heaped as if a pyre

Tall as any steeple spire,

I side with those who favor fire.

.

But then I think of how you drink

Milkshakes seeming from a sink.

You've never, ever skipped a slice

Of some dessert you thought was nice

(or even had to be asked twice).

So now I side with those who argue ice,

As arteries do also close from sweets

And will suffice.

(Copywrite DangerBard)

To show you the mettle he's made of, Mike now has it hanging from a prominent spot in his broom closet. He's still fat.

The only other likeable thing I can think of, poetry-wise, was a cartoon I saw in New Yorker magazine a few years back. Some middle aged guy is sitting at his breakfast table, looking out the window at a grey, drizzly day. Cradling his head in his hands, he says "April sucks." The caption was: TS Elliot Meets Beavis and Butthead.

Drop me a line (in prose) if you need an explanation.

Well, time to hit the sack, kids.

G'night. Don't let the bedbugs use their mandilbles on you.

*************************************************************

ps:

There once was a man from Nantuckett

Whose dick was so long he could suck it.

He said with a grin,

While wiping his chin,

'If my ear was a cunt, I could fuck it!'

Just in case you forgot.....