I think one of the phrases I hate to hear most, out of all the many phrases I ever hear, is when somone starts out like this, from MPR, "So and so, a listener from this-place, avidly followed our story on this-thing or this-place, and had a comment/some insight..." That, in and of itself, is not bad. I like commentary. If I didn't like commentary, I wouldn't read blogs. However, the next bit is the bit that always causes me to immediately hit the channel switch, "...that he set to verse."
Oh dude, f you. F you and f the MPR/NPR content director who felt you deserved air time. It's one thing to stick your lyrical crap about the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, or whatever other daily news item you're momentarily waxing poetic about, out onto your little blog fiefdom where it can at least be lost in the chaff and/or judged unworthy and studiously avoided by adding -poetry to Google searches. It's entirely another to force me to consider whether I'd rather hit a truck or turn the dial because I'm driving a stickshift in town with a soda in my non-dial-turning hand.
There are MFA programs where you can assault people with your poetry and they won't even know they're being abused. Please leave your versification there.
I'm not exactly sure how to interpret that link...
ReplyDelete:(
I needed an example of an MPR/NPR story that was obviously something not deserving of an on-air poem. The Woodrow Wilson Bridge seems perfect, as I KNOW someone must have written a poem about it. I just don't want to hear it.
ReplyDeleteYou have spared me any bad poetry, although your obviously Freudian dream details are a bit disturbing.
Woodrow Wilson bridge is falling down, falling down..
ReplyDeleteOkay, far be it from me to inflict my poetic incompetence on the world, especially since the explosion spoke so much louder than my words.
As for the dream -- you know it. Very worrisome.