Showing posts with label good poem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label good poem. Show all posts

Monday, June 6, 2016

June 6: Poet of the Week, Campbell McGrath, "Hemingway Dines on Boiled Shrimp and Beer"

A new week.  A new Poet of the Week.  Campbell McGrath--born in 1962 in Chicago.  MacArthur Genius.

And a new job.  It was great.  No phones ringing all day long.  I had extended periods of time to complete piles of work.  Plus, I was working with one of my best friends, Wonder Twin.  As in, we are so similar that we were probably separated at birth.  I met her first when she and her sister enrolled in my writing class at the university.  That was over 25 years ago, and we still enjoy each other's company.


Saint Marty had a good day, and now a good poem. . .

Hemingway Dines on Boiled Shrimp and Beer

by:  Campbell McGrath

I’m the original two-hearted brawler.
I gnaw the scrawny heads from prawns,
pummel those mute, translucent crustaceans,
wingless hummingbirds, salt-water spawned.
As the Catalonians do, I eat the eyes at once.
My brawny palms flatten their mainstays.
I pop the shells with my thumbs, then crunch.

Just watch me as I swagger and sprawl,
spice-mad and sated, then dabble in lager
before I go strolling for stronger waters
down to Sloppy Joe’s.  My stride as I stagger
shivers the islands, my fingers troll a thousand keys.
My appetite shakes the rock of the nation.
The force of my miction makes the mighty Gulf Stream.
 
 

Friday, April 26, 2013

April 26: A Good Poem at the End of a Long Day

Yes, I survived the P.O.E.T.S. Day meetings this morning intact.  They were long, contentious, angry, aggravating, and disappointing.  I don't want to go into details.  I still respect the university and English Department at which I teach.  I will not cast aspersions on any of my colleagues, no matter how wrong-headed and elitist I think they are.  I'm tired and need a good poem to end my day.

The one I have chosen is by U. A. Fanthorpe, and it's about Romulus and Remus, Blodeuwedd, Athena and Helen of Troy, Aprhodite, and Jesus Christ.  It's a poem I wish I had written.

And it makes Saint Marty very happy.

Nativities

 Godlings are born racily.

They are excavated
Into life by the strong licks
Of the world-cow, suckled
By goats, mares, wolves.

Blossom of oak, blossom of broom,
Blossom of meadowsweet
Go to their making.

They erupt through the paternal
Skull fully armed, hatch from an egg,
Or appear, foam-born,

In Cyprus, in a shell,
Wearing a great deal of hair
And nothing else.

This one arrived
At the time of the early lambs
By means of he usual channels.

The usual channel