Hey, Doug, take it easy, will you? Nobody's "pissing on" the Canadian
flag or "finer poets." Ram put this poem out here for comment, presumably,
with no more buttressing than the Brand Name poet's name (Marilyn Hacker)
and none of this additional info. on Page herself that you've now provided.
Various Poetryetceteras have expressed their opinion of this poem and/or
this poem for this occasion/setting--as we seem to have been invited to
do--and, if I may follow suit, you'll probably find my reaction even more
offensive: I got the giggles when I hit "In Praise of Ironing Pablo Neruda"
because of the Tillie Olsen echo that immediately suggested "I Stand Here
Ironing Pablo Neruda"--and the rest of the poem never recuperated itself
from my initial reaction.
Even if all of that won't feature in the poem's actual reading
circumstances, those circumstances include sublime settings (not counting
the UN itself, of course) for which the appropriateness of the selected poem
should be considered more than would seem to be the case. If I were asked to
judge this poem's suitability for the occasion and the settings, I'd reject
it as too risky because, like "chocolate box" landscape paintings of such
settings as the Antarctic, the poem is more suggestive of the ridiculous
than of the sublime. I think it would do an indignity to Page and her work
in general, as well as to the grand occasion and settings of the single
poem's reading, if it's so blatantly inappropriate that people have any
reactions of the sort that some of us here have had. Even those who don't
find "Planet Earth" a bad poem might well think it's a bad choice for this
occasion--a reaction that Ram will probably want to take into consideration,
given his own tremendous investment in the success of this event.
Candice
Boug Barbour wrote:
>ah comeon Mark, not that bad, & remember that it's meant for that huge
>audience. But then, I know Page's work, & while she has written many better
>poems, this fits. She is considered one of Canada's finer poets, & has been
>since the 40s. Her best lyrics really do work. I would agree that this poem
>feels more like the kind of poem a political rally like the UN thing would
>want, but let's not get carried away in pissing on it...
>
>And to david, that was the title of Neruda's poem quoted as epigraph (which
>I suspect you knew...).
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