But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dictionary word is, carriwitchet, it’s a noun.
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‘So, what is your favourite poem’?
‘Eh’?
‘A poem… Your favourite one’?
‘I, er, don’t have one.’
‘No’?
‘That’s right.’
‘I see… I really can’t understand that.’
‘Can’t you’?
‘No… Didn’t you do poems, at school’?
‘Oh yes, I think so, they sometimes made us learn them, and sometimes made us stand up and…’
‘Recite them’?
‘Yes.’
‘I expect that’s what put you off them, then.’
‘You think so’?
‘Possibly… Hey! You like early Bob Dylan, don’t you’?
‘Oh, I do, very much. Great lyrics’!
‘Well there you are then’!
‘Am I’?
‘Yes! That’s poetry, isn’t it’?
‘No.’
‘No? Of course, it is!… See, you like it, but…’
‘But, I just think that I don’t’?
‘Yes! Exactly’!
‘Listen… Would you like me to tell you, what I think, poetry, is’?
‘Alright. Go on, then.’
‘Are you ready’?
‘Yes, yes! Do, go on’!
‘A poem is a song… but with the best part, missing!… How’s that? How do you like those apples’?
‘Apples’?
‘Yes, a poem’s got no music in it! See’!
‘Well I…’
‘See, even a song, with really crap words, can still be a great one, full of meaning, emotion, and be very popular, and…’
‘Yes, but…’
‘And a great song, with crap, lyrics, “Love me do”, can easily beat the shit out of any apparently good poem.’
‘You are, a complete Philistine’!
‘Thank you… Have you heard those BBC programmes, on the radio, about poetry? Poets are so cocky, self confident, and such dull smug buggers, and…’
‘And what’?
‘And they are embarrassing!… I’ve met a few poets in my time, they were all awful! I knew one once, who was a bad, loud, rock drummer too’!
‘I see…’
‘Do you ever go to those poetry nights, that they have in pubs’?
‘Sometimes.’
‘Don’t you squirm’?
‘Of course not’!
‘Not even, a little bit’?
‘Only sometimes… Hey, you like Nabokov, don’t you’? Have you read, the novel, Pale Fire by him’?
‘Oh, yes, it’s very good.’
‘But a third of that book, is a long poem’!*
‘Ah yes, but I skipped those pages.’
‘You skipped them? You!…’
‘Me?…’
‘Yes’!
‘What’?
‘Buffoon’!
‘Oh, right ho…’
*I was the shadow of the waxwing slain
By the false azure in the windowpane;
I was the smudge of ashen fluff – and I…
Dave Whatt 