[New-Poetry] Head scratch

[Anny Ballardini]

I'm with you David, even without reading more.
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: David Graham 
  To: new-poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu & Views 
  Sent: Wednesday, April 09, 2008 6:49 PM
  Subject: [New-Poetry] Head scratch


  Sometimes I just scratch my head at the Academy of American Poets.  Today's daily poem offering, from Richard Kenney, strikes me as a most clunky bit of doggerel.


  It's titled "A Pot of Tea."  Here's are 2 stanzas; see what you think:


  Ginseng or the scent of lymph
  Or consequences queasing
  Into wide awareness, whence,
  Like an engine seizing


  Society remits a shudder
  Showing it has feeling,
  And the divers all have shaving cuts
  And the future’s in Darjeeling—


  And here's the whole thing, if you're thirsty for more:




  http://www.poets.org/sponsor-book-profile.php/prmBookID/512/prmSponsorID/167?utm_source=poemaday_040908&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=content_link&utm_term=conent_sponsorbook


  You certainly won't want to miss the rhyme of "earring" with "Hermann Göring," in any case.  Yes, I know that this is probably intended to be gloriously Byronic and breezy, but my ears catch mostly the huffing of someone who's trying too hard.


  *This* is the long-awaited book from Kenney--winner of both the Yale Younger & a MacArthur?  This is the best Knopf can find to publish these days, and the Academy to spotlight?  Kenney's written some very fine verse, and I hope the rest of his new book contains nothing but.  But. . . . 







  ========================================
  David Graham
  grahamd at ripon.edu


  Home Page:
  http://web.mac.com/drjazz


  Poetry Library:
  http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/DGPoLibrary.html
  ==========================================









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