…is more shitty poetry. So says Charlotte Cuevas on her online blog. Or doesn’t need. (she was being sarcastic) Charlotte is a napowrimo knocker, who feels that this month of unfettered poetry offerings brings out the worst in people. Poetry-wise anyhow.

“And we especially need more shitty poetry that conforms to predetermined themes and forms- daily prompts which relieve us from the bothersome task of coming up with something on our own.

“Write a persona poem from the viewpoint of the first thing you see when you look away from the computer screen.”

“Grab a blind person and write a sestina using the first six words they point to in the newspaper.”

I’m sorry, are we poets or are we vending machines? What the hell kind of poet prides themselves on “Hey, pick any random form and subject and I’ll make a poem out of it in 20 minutes or less or your money back.”

There’s more in the same vein, but to be honest I don’t give a shit anymore!

SHITTY POEM

Perhaps we were less deceived

Than first we believed

In nineteen-sixty-three.

Legs, The Beatles, moon-talk

And JFK going down that

Long slide to eternity.

 

Later, there was Dylan

Vietnam killing

And Mini’s both

Mechanical and mercurial

While all the time

We were shooting a line

That was both entertaining

And entrepreneurial

 

This wasn’t the way we were;

A generation of graven anonymities

Their money-God waxing

While free-thinkers wane.

Well are you shot of it, pal:

Nothing, like something,

Is happening again.