Dead Poets
Feb 18 2024
I just read this:
Plato denounced poetry for its falsehoods
and banned poets from the ideal society.
I wonder what was said
by some ancient Greek poet said
to offend the great man.
I suppose he was a literalist;
allegory
went over his head,
metaphor
was wasted on him.
Nevertheless, I feel a flush of pride
to be labelled a subversive.
To be on the outside
looking in.
To use my words
instead of my fists.
Of course, so few bother with poetry
Plato got his wish.
Just lucky for him
there were no novelists back then
no internet.
That even the written word
was rare.
But how my silly scribbles
about missed buses
sleeping dogs
and a walk in the woods
would merit expulsion
is beyond me.
Bad enough
they still want to censor, ban, suppress.
Keep the reading to shopping lists
and ads for shoes.
But not send us into exile,
curse our progeny,
burn
our thin volumes of verse.
At least not yet.
Instead, they just don't read.
Or humour us
with a brief recitation
at weddings and funerals
and the odd circumcision.
As well as compulsory education
that's closer to surgery
than pleasure.
A forensic autopsy
that dismembers a poem
line by line,
turning bored students
into cynical Platonists,
who would rather live in a cave
than read the dead poets
let alone a living one.
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