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Saturday, May 02, 2009

A Poet Gets No Respect

Photo_030609_003 I can feel the lazy days of summer ahead, but they aren't quite here yet.

Any of you seen the movie Prairie Home Companion? It was a movie I had been wanting to see. My wife was not real interested and we never saw it when it came out. Cathy did however record it on our DVR knowing both my daughter and I wanted to see it. We've had it for a week or two now, and Cathy decided to make a night of it.  We got pizza and settled in and watched it.  I enjoyed it thoroughly. Both Cathy and my daughter Shannon by the end were fighting to stay awake. Neither were impressed.   My wife's explanation as to why I might have enjoyed it was that it reminded her of my poetry... inaccessible.

On a related note, I subjected my immediate family to only one poem this Poetry Month. They seem to believe they are subjected to way more then any sane person should have to endure through their connection to me. So I sent them on the last day of April one poem. They all received one poem from me. I chose the Billy Collins poem, Introduction to Poetry. The poem concludes with the following two stanzas....

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.


They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.

Now Cathy liked the Collins poem, but she responded in an email, "It's the poet that needs to be tied to the chair and beaten with a rubber hose for writing an inaccessible poem...and I'm sure we all know what poet I am talking about. :)

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