just read this now (my 'Poetry' comes a little late), I thought it
sounded refreshingly honest. Case sounds just like a popstar talking
about poetry, which bugs me, but she isn't clueless.

KS

On 28/10/2007, MC Ward <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Rather different from Denise Levertov's essay, to say
> the least, singer-songwriter Neko Case's piece also
> has much to offer--and so charmingly!
>
> "My Flaming Hamster Wheel of Panic About Publicly
> Discussing Poetry in This Respected Forum"
>
> When I was asked by _Poetry_ to write an article for
> them I was ecstatic. I was flattered. I felt
> important! I agreed immediately. About twenty minutes
> after sending my e-mail of acceptance I paused to
> triumphantly sharpen my claws on the bookcase when I
> noticed the blazing, neon writing on the wall. It
> said: YOU'VE NEVER EVEN PASSED ENGLISH 101 AND
> EVERYONE WHO READS THIS MAGAZINE WILL KNOW IT. Why do
> I care? I'm not sure. I think it's because I don't
> want to let poetry down. Poetry is such a delicate,
> pretty lady with a candy exoskeleton on the outside of
> her crepe-paper dress. I am an awkward, heavy-handed
> mule of a high school dropout. I guess I just need
> permission to be in the same room with poetry.
>
> I think the fear began in about fifth grade. Right off
> the top they said poetry was supposed to have "form."
> Even writing a tiny haiku became a wrestling match
> with a Claymation Cyclops for me. (I watched a lot of
> _Sinbad_.) We aren't too cool for poetry; it's the
> other way around. At least that's the impression I
> took from public school. The fact that these feelings
> would remain into adulthood is ridiculous. We all have
> the right to poetry! How could I still think it's for
> other people? Smarter people. What's doubly confusing
> is I don't have the same reservations when poetry is
> accompanied by music. Perhaps I feel that way because
> there is music all around us--it's the wallpaper of
> our lives. It's not considered precious in American
> culture unless a symphony is performing it.
>
> I _do_ know when a string of printed words busts my
> little dam and the tears spill over and I sponge them
> up with my T-shirt. I couldn't give you that formula
> before it happens, it just hits me like a bat to the
> face. That's a sweet, hot, amazing, embarrassing
> moment. It even makes me feel a little included, as if
> I have to be "ready for the poetry" for it to be
> happening.
>
> I can't choose which kind of poetry I like best.
> Sonnets? Prose? I don't know the terminology. I just
> blurt out some fragmented gibberish into the vast,
> woodsy country of poetry. It freezes in midair. Here
> come some examples now . . .
>
> Shakespeare's _Titus Andronicus_ haunts me. Aaron's
> death speech is veiled, venomous gospel music. I read
> it over and over even though I've already memorized it
> like a teenage girl in love. W.H. Auden scares me
> under the couch (even when he's being funny). I hold
> my flashlight on "The Witnesses," with its haunting
> "humpbacked surgeons / And the scissors man," until my
> arm shakes, my trusty dictionary in my other hand.
> Dorothy Parker makes me manic! I can't even make it
> through the first three lines of "The Godmother"
> without bursting into tears. Lynda Barry and Sherman
> Alexie save my life constantly. They battle identity
> crisis with a sense of humor and a language that
> speaks so hard to me because they came from my home,
> in my own time, and they talk to me in our special
> parlance. They tell me I'm not crazy because they
> remember it too. It really is the old Washington State
> that created my personal brain-picture ABC's. (D is
> for "Douglas fir.") The same Washington State I can
> never go back to. Barry and Alexie volunteer to go in
> my place. Their memories make friends with mine. I
> can't live without them.
>
> What do these poets have in common? They don't write
> sycophantic, roman-numeraled-volumed postcards to God.
> They don't get all "love-ity-love-love" either. I get
> the sense they imagine their audience and want to
> comfort them. They are so good at it they even have
> the ability to comfort us with scariness. Sadness too.
> I think that is a powerful magic. They don't just
> write poetry either;  they are playwrights and
> painters and singers and novelists.
>
> How can we help them out? I guess we keep on needing
> them, even if it's kind of a secret. If the poets
> handed out anonymous comment cards for us shy poetry
> lovers to fill out so they could get a better idea of
> what we needed, I would direct them to the Osbourne
> Brothers' bluegrass classic, "Rocky Top." They say in
> two lines what poets and writers "Anna Karenina"
> themselves to death to convey, about a girl who's
> "wild as a mink, but sweet as soda pop / I still dream
> about that." If those lines were written about me I
> could lie down and die. It is perfection. Uncool
> perfection.
>
> Neko Case
> _Poetry_
> (November 2007)
>
>
>
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