tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6531553.post3757080047940645252..comments2023-06-27T01:34:35.359-07:00Comments on Ted Burke LIKE IT OR NOT: Stephen Dunn hits it hardTED BURKEhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16610296721891201100noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6531553.post-17212980352914823182009-08-28T13:10:08.594-07:002009-08-28T13:10:08.594-07:00Yes, I prefer a poem that does that kind of indire...Yes, I prefer a poem that does that kind of indirection. It's rarer than one would think. Especially good in this vein is Thomas Lux's poem <i>So You Put the Dog to Sleep</i>:<br /><br />"I have no dog, but must be<br />Somewhere there's one belongs to me."<br />--John Kendrick Bangs<br /><br />You love your dog and carve his steaks<br />(marbled, tgender, aged) in the shape of hearts.<br />You let him on your lap at will<br /><br />and call him by a lover's name:Liebschen,<br />pooch-o-mine, lamby, honey tart,<br />and you fill your voice with tenderness, woo.<br /><br />He loves you too, that's his only job,<br />it's how he pays his room and board.<br />Behind his devotion, though, his dopey looks,<br /><br />he might be a beast who wants your house,<br />your wife; who in fact loathes you, his lord.<br />His jaws snapping while you sleep means dreams<br /><br />of eating your face: nose, lips, eyebrows, ears...<br />But soon your dog gets old, his legs<br />go bad, he's nearly blind, you puree his meat<br /><br />and feed him with a spoon. It's hard to say<br />who hates whom more. He will not beg.<br />So you put the dog to sleep, Bad dog.<br /><br />(from <i>New and Selected Poems</i>, 1995)<br /><br />My initial reaction was to take this is as hilariously mean spirited and leave it at that, but a third and then a fourth reading revealed a more complex musing; our obsession with attaining comfort and remaining comfortable and discarding things we've declared our deepest feelings for once, blaming our depression on the object of desire, not our wanton need.TED BURKEhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16610296721891201100noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6531553.post-74066435807998028912009-08-28T10:15:48.311-07:002009-08-28T10:15:48.311-07:00This is what Langston Hughes does for me as well; ...This is what Langston Hughes does for me as well; tricks you into thinking, for a moment, that his poetry might be simple, until you find yourself thinking over and over about something you've read.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com