I recently received an email—in the form of a poem—from my brother.
***
The Sister’s Poetry
poetry.
self absorbed people with time on their hands
sylvia plath
i have to throw up now
pretentious. arrogant. boring.
dear poets, no one gives a shit
sincerely, the world.
the mother calls
to read the sisters poetry
sigh. speakerphone while i jab this knitting needle into my eye
the words are about the house
where we grew up
the words reach my ears
but don’t really connect
on account of the blood from my eye
the mother reads it again
this time i listen
i did not hate the sister’s poem
maybe i like these words
they are interesting and make me feel things
they are not pretentious, they are not arrogant, they are not boring
clearly this is not poetry
glad i got to the bottom of that
***
I think he needs his own blog, yes?
I was going to get into an essay about how his poem encapsulates the problem with poetry and expectations about poetry…blah blah blah…and then I was afraid I would turn into, well, Sylvia Plath. So I stopped.
Well done, brother.
And I love you, too.
Simply. Awesome.
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I will tell him you said so. 🙂
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excellent poem! i like “the” mother, “the” sister.
from marianne moore about poetry: I, too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond
all this fiddle.
Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, one
discovers in
it after all, a place for the genuine.
funny and sweet blog!
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Oh, I love the quote, and I will pass on your praise. Thanks, Mary!
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Love it 🙂
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Thanks, Susan! I’ll pass it on…
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