That word is a two-edged sword. Both the Poet Laureate and I have felt the laceration. While one doesn’t have to climb a rickety ladder up the ivory tower to steal meaning like bedsheets from the turret chamber, it would be nice for once to be thought of as erudite and join that cocktail party of MFA’s and PhD’s, to drink a respectable drink. I am not one to hide behind a screen of language. I haven’t read Hamilton’s Mythology from cover to cover. I don’t use Greek epigrams. I speak in Everyday. Does that make me less of an artist? I say no. I’d rather be your buddy, buying you a beer in a loud, smoky bar, offering grass-roots wisdom than be your professor in a stuffy classroom with hardwood, wraparound chairs, where we have to open the transom to let the air in.

03/06/2002

Posted on 03/06/2002
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