Bad Poetry - May 4 2022

 

Bad Poetry

May 4 2022

There is something in alliteration

that makes us all poets.

Because when I read this today

it struck me as a pure distillation

of how it should feel.

Lavish love,

which sounds like a lush embrace,

plush arms, outstretched

to welcome you in.

But I am a frugal man

and non-demonstrative.

So the extravagance

of lavish love

is almost too much for me.

It's a belly laugh

with snot coming out of your nose,

instead of the appreciative nod

and measured grunt

I'm more comfortable with.

Which poets

who live by the dictum “less is more”

know all too well.

But how fervently

I wish it were so.

To be loved lavishly, unstintingly.

To be read bad poetry

and the odd lame limerick

from someone sure enough

to know they won't be judged,

no matter how over-written

or shoe-horned-in the rhyme.

Who is loving enough

to entwine their life with yours,

giving enough

to soldier on

despite your many flaws.

I read this on Garrison Keillor's column today. The last line of this paragraph stopped me cold.

I was five when our family was split by a schism in the Sanctified Brethren caused by two preachers who loved the Lord but loathed each other. It was more tribal than Bible. Dad’s family was on one side of the schism and Mother’s on the other, and Dad stuck with Mother. What I remember was the kindness and generosity of Dad’s sisters, my loving aunts who never spoke of the split to me ever, not even by implication. I felt lavishly loved by them.