What We Expect Of The Poet: Something Interesting (2015-07-21)
V. The Other Poet And I Went To This Farm
The Other Poet and I went to this farm to get some chicken manure for my garden. It was a shovel-your-own place, but the price was right - only twenty-five cents a bag. I'd purchased green plastic garbage bags, but it turned out that they weren't intended for hauling the soggy, rather heavy, chicken shit.
When I lifted the first fully packed bag, I had a premonition. Still I hugged it to my chest and staggered off toward the car. Suddenly I felt my fingers go through the plastic and sink into the warm, wet contents. Then as the rich aroma wafted up to my nose, the whole bag tore to shreds, leaving me holding a few scraps of green plastic and a couple handfuls of what-helps-your-garden-grow. The manure poured down my legs and buried my feet.
The Other Poet came running up. "I know you'll want to, but don't write about this incident without making a few critical changes," he said. I asked him why. "It's an imperfect parable," he replied. Standing shin deep in ripe chicken shit, I wasn't feeling very quick witted, so once again I asked for an explanation. "Because," he said as though speaking to a child, "for a poet, it should have been bullshit."
(Excerpt from “The Art Of Prosody” chapter of my book Cold Pigging Poetics)
