Damn me, Oprah Winfrey; so you’re the poet laureate. No, that’s not right. Is it Anne Rice? It changes Oftener than the weather. Damn me, David Berkowitz—no, that’s not It either. Didn’t it used to be Billy Collins? And what the hell was that all about? It’s like Awarding the Nobel in medicine to some half-baked Quack with a bedside manner. No offense, Billy Collins. You don’t have enemies.
Oh;
That was what that was about.
Let’s face it. Nowadays everybody and his brother-in-law is the poet laureate. That guy mowing the grass In the public park with the orange vest and Mismatched socks, he’s the poet laureate. A carful of Mexicans high on tequila and the cult Of the virgin, busting out colorful with sweet andeles— They’re the poet laureate. If Kid Rock were suddenly the poet laureate, then Things would change.
Somebody has to feel it.
Passions would ignite.
People would throw moon pies,
From festively colored hammocks,
And pull each other’s hair out, Gouge out each other’s lyin’ eyes.
That’s what I’m all about.
Change.
OK, so T.S. Eliot hated Whitman, despised every Little thing he stood for, projectile-vomited every time.
He heard the other’s name. Now that I’ve won my own Palme d’Or at Cannes for Very Best Actress in an Undertaker’s role, I feel I can say these things.
Let loose.
Get it
Out in the open.
But in his infirm old age, the man who’d penned “Geronition,” then forgotten what he’d written, relented Whitman? He ain’t so awful. So then suddenly everybody liked Whitman again, The history of our literature. If it doesn’t make you sit down In the middle of a crowded urban sidewalk and set the world Not to mention your wrongful terminations, then you’ll Probably just go to work tomorrow.
Quick: Who’s the poet laureate? I’ll have poet laureates for 600, Alex. That’s right! You Win the trip to Bermuda! The charming, Canadian-born host Of Jeopardy is our one and only poet laureate.
