Monday, March 23, 2009

Bait & Switch


Bait & Switch


Can you remember when you picked this
up, started reading and thought: "How
nice, a flow of ice cream splashing
into a plum purple bowl of syllables
that go crack, pop, snap; topped
with a fistful of wild mount rasp-
berries, so plump and sweet
that a black bear might kill for them?"

Well, that's what it was--"was".
That was the bait. But when
you took your eyes off the page
and thought,"What trash! That crass
low poet will get none of my praise:
I'll slice up his poem with my razor
tongue"--that's when I made the switch.

What you've got now is
a sack of dirty sand, and
I'm not going to untie your ass
until you've swallowed every bite.


Harvey Goldner

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