Here I sit, broken hearted…

But really, I’m fine with a serious discussion of literature, I think Fat Jerry could benefit from some sincerity here and there.

Of course, that’s always a risky proposition for anyone to start, because of insecure men such as myself making cracks.

I wasn’t suggesting a serious discussion. You can take the poem seriously, and discuss it unseriously. Or you can discuss it seriously too if you like, but feel free to be irreverent. That was sort of the idea.

I think somebody had a bad day at Fairway, is all I’m saying.

Then it too went away.
Boldly going.
Where no thing had gone before.

Wiating for the string quartet,
and for Bill Gates to invent
spell
checking
soft
wares.

Ouch. That’s my typo, not Mr. Ashberry’s. I s’pose I should’ve used the spellchecker available in the internal system.

Dimmer’s basic rules of the poem #1:

Any poem using the phrase “hoar-frost” is to be avoided. The tainted paper upon which is imprinted is best used for lavatorial supplies.

So, to round this off, here is the offical dimslation of a Baudlair poem.

J’aime le souvenir de ces époques nues
(My parents went to Vegas and all I got was a lousy t-shirt)

J’aime le souvenir de ces époques nues,
(I think I just said that, and good poems never repeat the first line as the title.)
Dont Phoebus se plaisait à dorer les statues.
(Would you close the fucking door? It’s cold in here and my nipples are hard as a marble statue.)
Alors l’homme et la femme en leur agilité
(I don’t like poofs. Unless if they are cute.)
Jouissaient sans mensonge et sans anxiété,
(Feebie is the one I like best in “Friends”.
Et, le ciel amoureux leur caressant l’échine,
(Did I just run over your dog? I am so sorry.)
Exerçaient la santé de leur noble machine.
(You have an XBox?!? Can I play?)
Cybèle alors, fertile en produits généreux,
(Oh, it’s downloading it’s new firmware so we should let it be for a month or so)
Ne trouvait point ses fils un poids trop onéreux,
(I can stick my iPod up my own ass and the remote still works!)
Mais, louve au coeur gonflé de tendresses communes
Abreuvait l’univers à ses tétines brunes.
(I will come to the party after I level my WoW Druid to 42, didn’t you hear? YOU DAFT COW!)
L’homme, élégant, robuste et fort, avait le droit
(That John Waters makes a good movie now and then.)
D’être fier des beautés qui le nommaient leur roi;
(Does this have spinache in it?)
Fruits purs de tout outrage et vierges de gerçures,
(We must not eat the furry fruits/we know not where they’ve been/who knows upon whose bones they’ve knawed/the awful little beings.)
Dont la chair lisse et ferme appelait les morsures!
(Yes, I could use a quick sit down, it’s been an awful terse verse.)

Le Poète aujourd’hui, quand il veut concevoir
(I wouldn’t buy a Chrysler if you Paidmear.)
Ces natives grandeurs, aux lieux où se font voir
(The fonts that come with the operating system do such ass)
La nudité de l’homme et celle de la femme,
(But I like Internet Porn! the Internet is for Porn!)
Sent un froid ténébreux envelopper son âme
(Where are the envelopes?)
Devant ce noir tableau plein d’épouvantement.
(On the table, Cracker McCracken)
Ô monstruosités pleurant leur vêtement!
(My! So big! I could fit a [deleted] dick in there and it wouldn’t touch the sides!)
Ô ridicules troncs! torses dignes des masques!
(Don’t be silly, and also don’t hurry home)
Ô pauvres corps tordus, maigres, ventrus ou flasques,
(I though you loved me for my mind not my girth?")
Que le dieu de l’Utile, implacable et serein,
(Dream on, tiddywinks.)
Enfants, emmaillota dans ses langes d’airain!
(If I fucked children, would you care?)
Et vous, femmes, hélas! pâles comme des cierges,
(As long as it’s not me or my momma.)
Que ronge et que nourrit la débauche, et vous, vierges,
(That’s so wrong!)
Du vice maternel traînant l’hérédité
(Can I buy this by the bolt?)
Et toutes les hideurs de la fécondité!
(Only if you love your mother till she dies.)

Nous avons, il est vrai, nations corrompues,
(You sick fuck.)
Aux peuples anciens des beautés inconnues:
(Yeah, me and the puppies both.)
Des visages rongés par les chancres du coeur,
(Two wrongs don;t make a right!)
Et comme qui dirait des beautés de langueur;
(yes, but at least I don’t speak pretentious French)
Mais ces inventions de nos muses tardives
(I think their is a Taco Bell near here.)
N’empêcheront jamais les races maladives
(Super! I need softer bowel movements, now!)
De rendre à la jeunesse un hommage profond,
(Have you ever read anything by Camus, maybe Sarte?)
— À la sainte jeunesse, à l’air simple, au doux front,
(I look like a poof to you?)
À l’oeil limpide et clair ainsi qu’une eau courante,
(I like clam chowder.)
Et qui va répandant sur tout, insouciante
(OK, but don’t pee on me unless if I ask.)
Comme l’azur du ciel, les oiseaux et les fleurs,
(Would I?)
Ses parfums, ses chansons et ses douces chaleurs!
(Oh you lying bitch! I can hardly fucking breathe.

— Charles Baudelaire
(and dimmer)

Gimme Uncle Shelby any day.

Senior year in high school, each student in our English class had to bring in a poem and “analyze” it. I couldn’t choose one. I submitted no fewer than six poems for the enjoyment of my classmates and discussed at least three. Of course one of them went:

The baby bat screamed out in fright
Turn on the dark
I’m afraid of the light

And then there’s the one that I regularly quote at people when I’m feeling stupid:

Mama said I’d lose my head if it wasn’t fastened on
Well today I guess it wasn’t
‘Cause while playing with my cousin
It fell off and rolled away and now it’s gone...

And I remember when I thought Lafcadio was a long book…

Uncle Shelby was on a waiting list at our library. We each passed it around between ourselves.

But can we keep the discussion, jokey or not, to this poem? Dimmer, if you want to discuss another, post that poem in the next part of the series.

Oh, sorry.

I have nothing to say, then.

But Lady P:
that poem sucks
and not in a good
fashion, such
suck as
ass or
to
es.

The best part:
“then it too went away”
as you should, poor poet failure fuck.

"On thread”
she says
she’d like to keep us.
“On the rag!”
I reply
(but lets keep that just between us).

Dimmer, you know shit and you’re not funny.

Not love you?  Dear, I’d pay ten quid for you
Five down, and five when I got rid of you.
--Philip Larkin

Lines For The Fortune Cookies


I think you’re wonderful and so does everyone else.

Just as Jackie Kennedy has a baby boy, so will you--even bigger.

You will meet a tall beautiful blonde stranger, and you will not say hello.

You will take a long trip and you will be very happy, though alone.

You will marry the first person who tells you your eyes are like scrambled eggs.

In the beginning there was YOU--there will always be YOU, I guess.

You will write a great play and it will run for three performances.

Please phone The Village Voice immediately: they want to interview you.

Roger L. Stevens and Kermit Bloomgarden have their eyes on you.

Relax a little; one of your most celebrated nervous tics will be your undoing.

Your first volume of poetry will be published as soon as you finish it.

You may be a hit uptown, but downtown you’re legendary!

Your walk has a musical quality which will bring you fame and fortune.

You will eat cake.

Who do you think you are, anyway? Jo Van Fleet?

You think your life is like Pirandello, but it’s really like O’Neill.

A few dance lessons with James Waring and who knows? Maybe something will happen.

That’s not a run in your stocking, it’s a hand on your leg.

I realize you’ve lived in France, but that doesn’t mean you know EVERYTHING!

You should wear white more often--it becomes you.

The next person to speak to you will have a very intriquing proposal to make.

A lot of people in this room wish they were you.

Have you been to Mike Goldberg’s show? Al Leslie’s? Lee Krasner’s?

At times, your disinterestedness may seem insincere, to strangers.

Now that the election’s over, what are you going to do with yourself?

You are a prisoner in a croissant factory and you love it.

You eat meat. Why do you eat meat?

Beyond the horizon there is a vale of gloom.

You too could be Premier of France, if only ... if only…

Frank O’Hara

You eat meat. Why do you eat meat?
I am a midget, and it was RIGHT THERE.