Chip MacGregor .com

Sandra's Favorite Book...

While Chip is vacationing in Hawaii, look for posts from the rest of the MacGregor Literary staff. Not surprisingly, “Favorite Books” is the topic of choice for our crowd of book lovers. Don’t be afraid to chime in with your thoughts on these top picks.

 

 

 

Sandra Bishop is a literary agent with MacGregor Literary, Inc. and represents fiction and nonfiction authors in multiple genres and with varying levels of publication background. She was recently named Vice President of the agency.

 

When I was growing up, my grandmother always kept a copy of GONE WITH THE WIND by her chair. Always.

When she needed to put her feet up and rest from her work, she would grab it and read a passage—it rarely mattered where she’d left off. She didn’t use bookmarks. She’d just pick it up and “visit with Scarlett,” sometimes out loud.

I have a fondness and appreciation for the commercial success of Ms. Mitchell’s book, of course, but mostly my fondness is driven by how much the book reminds me of someone I loved dearly. I consider it one of my most fav-o-rite treasures, though I hesitate to leave it out in its condition. It lives on my bookshelf, its pages tattered and torn, and its cover made over with a scrap of wallpaper from Grandma’s last kitchen.

I’ve heard it said that if it were being sold today, it would never make it. Too much description. Pacing problems, etc. But that’s another blog post for another day, perhaps by someone who has read it more recently than have I.

I may not have inherited grandma’s everyday huger for tales of Tara, but I did retain her habit of reading a passage of a favorite book on occasion—just picking it up and thumbing to a random spot to read for a bit. It’s been awhile, though, since I’ve allowed myself the joy of stopping in for brief visits with Reuben, Swede, and Jeremiah Land of PEACE LIKE A RIVER by Leif Enger.

Having just pulled it from my shelf, I’ll do so now, though. In fact, I’ll just flip it open and see where it lands. I promise not to cherry pick, but to share a passage from wherever it falls open… 

Here goes:

Remember August Shultz, in whose barley I made the most panicked job a boy ever did of shooting a wild goose?

 At the bottom of a January cold snap we received a three-cent postcard from August:

 Hello All

     Old friend Speedy came by last night. I wondered if he would and By Goodness he did. Weaselly skinny but strong, sends regards, we were glad to have him, Birdie had kielbasa, it went fast!

 Aug & Birdi

 PS: Best to your friend Andreeson

 Agghhhhh!!!  I landed on a tough patch from which to make my point about this book, and my love for reading it over and over and over. And over again.

It’s still possible, though, just by looking at the first three words of this passage. “Remember August Shultz…” Don’t you love that? It’s Reuben, the protagonist, asking if we remember, with him, a story he remembers about his father’s life long friend, a character to whom he’d actually not introduced us in person, though we’ve long by now gotten the feeling by now we know him just by sheer proximity to him having always been a part of their lives—if not in it on a regular basis.

To reinforce this, rather than just referencing August and explaining his importance to the family, he threads his own memory into the present, and brings us along with him, so we feel the weight of the moment when this important note arrives. In doing this, he warms us to his ongoing affection for this family friend, and it’s as if we’re family too. Which is perfect given the cryptic nature of the three-cent postcard which lets Reuben, Swede, and Dad know that their son and brother, Davy, is safe, and that they took a risk to love and feed him, even with someone menacing afoot. Of course they did. That’s what a lifelong friend of the family would do, right?

It seems simple, his way of asking “Remember August?” but it isn’t simple at all. It’s brilliant. Think of this: when you think of people who have always been in your life, how do you think of them? Do you see just their face? (Well, actually, perhaps in this day of Facebook you do!) Or do you usually, instead, feel their presence in relation to experiences you’ve shared? I am convinced that’s what the author was up to here. Maybe it just happened, and he used it. But, based on other “clever-but-not-feeling-clever” spots in the book, I don’t think so.

Like this one:

There’s this passage, later in the book, after Davy is long on the lam, in which Reuben and his kid sister Swede are invited to read an obit which had been tucked into a scrapbook by Roxanna, the woman who pumped gas for them after they’d miraculously driven for hours on no gas, through “wind-sacked, immobile towns with Presbyterians and Lutherans, and secure Methodists standing around their church doors.”  (Not having come from the plains, I wondered, did Methodists need to be extra secure to stand outside?)

Anyway, the reading of the obit at this point in the story is, particularly to Swede, a nine year old girl who had “lost her heart to the West early on” (how much earlier could it have been, one briefly wonders, but then marvels at the charm of it) is significant because it invites her (and us) to ponder Roxanna’s theory that Butch Cassidy didn’t actually die in Bolivia, a fugitive. That he died in Kansas, Jonas Robert Work, a decade and half before, in the wind swept town of Reece. This notion is introduced to them by Roxanna, just when they need to know that that she knows the adventure, the quest, they are on to find Davy will, quite possibly not end as anyone expects, and that things are not always only as they appear, and that sometimes, even, regular stories disguise the most ambitious legends. Or is it that legends disguise the most regular of stories?

The build up to this notion is perfect, and casual, and yet I can feel Swede hanging on the edge of her seat, wide-eyed, her imagination pining at every word as it develops. The drawing out is purposeful and well placed and masterful, and feeds our own hope, as well as Swede’s and Reuben’s, just when we all need it.

This is an amazingly clever book, and yet it doesn’t feel clever, somehow. On one level, it’s just a story about a widowed Dad trying to raise his kids in the 1950’s. It’s Americana, and a fresh story about miracles. It’s a quest for justice, and a time worn tale about the power of familial love and sacrifice. It’s a story that inspires us to believe that the memories of our lives will live on, and one which reminds us that we can be just as much in the making of them, as in their telling later.

I’ll admit, I read the beginning and the end most often, just to feed my need for the story. And when I do, I am at once transported and reminiscent. I remember the before and the ahead of it. All that led there, and everywhere else we’re headed. And each time, I practically swoon—though never as hard as the first time, the time when I’d first closed the cover, tears streaming down my cheeks, and had literally clutched it to my chest, then turned immediately back to page one to start again.

But it’s been too long, actually, since I’ve allowed myself to wander in and out of this family’s quest for their Davy. I’m feeling inspired to do so again. Tonight though, my eyes are heavy. I’ll start tomorrow. For, after all, tomorrow is another day.

And the winner is...

The 2010 Bad Poetry Contest is now complete, and let me just state that this is further evidence of the rampant use of illegal drugs in this country. We have a number of weiners...

THE EVIL WIND AWARD goes to James L Rubart ("The Great Rudini") for this bit o' badness:

The Wind

The wind came softly, like a cat crawling up on top of my head and settling down for the afternoon,

It wooed me from my complacency, from my depths of malcontent, from my moment of melancholious daydreaming,

It brought upon its unseen arms a dandelion spore which danced upon my ear, carrying with it the promise that spring had arrived and would not be leaving soon,

The wind,

The wind,

The wind,

I stretched forth my hands and embraced my cousin, my brother, myself, my soul,

The wind,

The wind,

The wind.

Posted by: Jim Rubart 

You read that, and you just realize Jim should never have broken that particular wind. Speaking of foul winds, Betty Castleberry won this year's coveted WORST WINDY CRUD AWARD with a doozy entitled "Life Wind"... 

The wind blows life my way
And deposits stuff in my hair
Like molded sprinkly things on doughnuts

But not just in my hair
It leaves trash in my soul
In the deepest, most private part of my soul
Where nothing, not even the wind, should ever go.

But now it is there
Like some kind of armed intruder
With a big, evil weapon

A weapon that has spikes
And shoots bullets, too
A weapon that will not let me rest
And keeps me awake almost every night

My torment is awful
Really awful
I just can't explain how awful

But it is a little bit like
Smelling a skunk
Or watching somebody 
Self-pierce their navel

Will this black wind ever cease,
Or am I doomed to
Rancid skunk smells forever?

Posted by: Betty Castleberry

The WORST ATTEMPT AT POE AWARD goes to Becky Mushko, for her fabulously bad riff called "Hannibal Lee"...

Twas many and many a year ago

In a kennel owned by me,
There lived a poodle whom you may know
By the name of Hannibal Lee.
And this poodle lived with no other thought
Than to breed for a hefty stud fee.

He wasn’t a child but he was half wild;
In back alleys breed did he!
He bred with a joy that was more than a joy
My poodle Hannibal Lee.
An action that caused the cops to chase
Hannibal Lee and me.

And this was the reason that late one night
Near our kennel owned by me, 
A man jumped out of a car that night, grabbing 
My poodle Hannibal Lee
And took him off to an unscrupulous vet’s
Where they neutered Hannibal Lee.
And hauled me into court and made me pay a hefty fee.

Rival breeders, not half so proud of their dogs
Had envied him and me!
Yes! That was the reason as all must know,
That they neutered Hannibal Lee.

But his lust is stronger by far than the lust
Of dogs more intact than he,
Of dogs with a good pedigree.
And neither dog-catchers nor unscrupulous vets
Can ever dissever my desire to acquire
A clone of Hannibal Lee.

For a dog never howls without elicting growls
From the wobegon Hannibal Lee.
From tearful eyes I see hackles rise 
On the un-manned Hannibal Lee.

And so nowadays I cry and he bays
For his lost manhood ways.
My poodle, my doggie, my life and my pride
Who’ll know no more a doggie bride.
In that kennel owned by me;
In that empty kennel owned by me.

Posted by: Becky Mushko

But if you want strange visions, take a look at this year's WORST PROZAC POEM, from Gina Conroy, who really needs to have the doctor up her meds:

Secret Admirer

My love for you is full and overflowing
Like my bladder after I can no longer hold it
Like I want to hold you…But you are not here
And I don’t blame you, well, yes I do.
I blame you for everything. 
My depression, the medications, my therapist’s bill.

My Prozatic double vision wouldn’t be so bad if I saw two of you. 
And the nightmares from hell might be bearable 
if I woke up next to you. 
And the drool on my pillow, shouldn’t be there. 
It should be you, on my pillow, but you’re not. 
You're safe in your warm bed, snuggled next to your...dog 
who's on your pillow...drooling.

And you don't care! You lie there like I don't even exist. 
Like I'm not knocking on the window of your heart.
I feel my soul emptying of life, 
like my bladder right now on your lawn, 
and that’s your fault too!

Posted by: Gina Conroy

And that can barely hold a candle to the true deepfulness and reflectivosity of John Upchurch who wretched up this hunk o' poetry:

Anguish.
Pain.
Hurt.

You see those periods? That's how
Serious I am (and even on separate
Lines). My thoughts are so deep
That whole sentences
Cannot contain them--not even
Complex compound sentences
With and after and, but
After but.

Posted by: JohnUpChurch

Speaking of putrid poems and serious angst, let's turn to a female college student, for who would know better? The following foul tripe was penned by Melissa Kerkhoff:

It's About my Soul Isn't It?

I was eating my fries,
alone as usual.
I had consumed most of them then I saw
In the bottom of the basket
Black.
Crumbled crusty bits
of fries.
Dark and frail. 
Fragile and hopeless.
Like my soul.

I was walking in the sunshine,
alone as usual
when my eyes trailed off into the grass.
I saw among the happy blades a single feather.
A dark feather.
Probably from a raven.
It was black and alone
Like my soul.
Even in a field of happy grass-blades,
it was dark and alone.

I was staring out my window, 
alone as usual,
when I noticed the blackness of my window pane.
The darkness of it framed the falling light.
Soon all the light would be encompassed
by the darkness.
By the black void of the window pane
and the black void of the night.
It reminded me of my soul.

I went scuba diving,
alone as usual.
I saw the black stripes on a fish.
The black seemed to rip into its colors.
It ripped and tore all vitality away.
Like my soul.
And I realize here in the depth of the sea
that not even the fish
can bring a light to my dark soul

And, of course, the BURNING LOINS AWARD (also called the "Cruex Award") goes to Ron Benson for this little bit of doggerel: 

My Loin’s Burn
(The Intrinsic Value of The Possessive Apostrophe and Other Critical Punctuation)

Late in the cooling evening,
Under the canopy of stars,
I stare and ponder
My loin’s burn.

There in the black long armory,
Heat like a hot, hot, heater.
Smoking still, I spy it:
My loin’s burn.

She asked for something beautiful,
A wonder in a marinade.
I sniff the painful memory;
My loin’s burn.

The fire – inconsistency.
Parts too cool, parts hot as . . .
Hell could not contain
My loin’s burn.

Taste the lovely wiggly
Rescued from obscurity.
Knife it, cut it, savor now:
My loin’s burn.

Doesn't that just make you want to run out and buy some ointment? This year's WORST LOVE POEM USING THE WORD LAME goes to Andrea Heinecke, who shared this from the heart of her bottom:

i love you i hate you (breakup)

You left me twitching in the rain 
Like a cucumber without its skin
Falling
Like a penguin towards its prey

There’s guile in your eyes, your voice 
The allure of a siren 
Crying for (my) blood 
[my death]

You told me you loved me
But then you walked away
Like a praying mantis after the act 
Who eats her mate

ET TU, BRUTE?

You battered my heart 
As Donne once said 
But you’re not God 
You’re lame

Posted by: Andrea Heinecke 

Which must be followed by THE WORST LOVE POEM THAT FAILS TO USE THE WORD LAME from philospher-poetess Aimee Salter, who might have actually been sober when penning the words:

OUr love is like a rose
A really really big rose
Bigger than any rose anyone else has ever compared their love to before.
Seriously huge.
A rose as big as a a planet.
No the sun.
Our love is a rose as big as a planet and as bright as the sun. 
So bright it would burn your eyeballs 
Out of your head. 
You’d walk around with these gaping holes where your eyeballs should be 
If you looked at our love.
And this huge rose, 
Bigger than a planet 
And as bright as the sun 
Doesn’t have any thorns.
Well, okay it does but the thorns don’t have points. 
They’re just nubs.
Nubs that wouldn’t hurt a ginormous baby 
If a baby was big enough to pick the planet-sized, sun-rose.
The only way the nubs would ever hurt anyone 
Is if you stuffed them into the gaping eye-holes 
Left behind when someone looked at the brightness of our love.
Cause it they would get infected with the nubs in there.
But even then they could just look at 
The brightness of our love again
And the brightness would burn so bright
It would cauterize the nub-infection
And burn the nubs out too.
So your gaping eye-holes would heal.
They would be healed by the burning brightness of our 
Massive, planet-sized, eye-searing, wound-cauterizing, love-rose
Even though your mother thinks I don’t deserve you.

(c) 2010 Aimee L. Salter

The RUNNER UP TO A BUNCH OF LOSER POETS award goes to Judith Millar, and it's important to remember that she's a runner up, since if our champion fails his drug test and cannot actually serve as Poetry Champion, Judith will be expected to hock his crown and bail him out. Our runner up is this unnamed ditty:

I wandered lonely as a cloud – 
well not a real cloud
at least not a cumulus cloud
which really can’t be trusted
and may well morph into a cumulonimbus
and drip on people later in the day
and certainly not a cirrus fibratus
with its fibrous mane’s tale – 
not really the wandering type
(they don’t, as a rule, drift
if you get my drift)
I wandered more as a 
stratocumulus
following along, as they do,
after a cold front – 
the cold front left in your wake
when you took your love
and just took off
like a cirrus duplicatus
full of mean looks
and icy crystals
after we hit that period
of severe turbulence
that left me lonely
and wandering like some
cast-off cloud
not a bit fluffy or Wordsworthian -
and not a daffodil in sight.

c2010 Judith Millar

And THIS YEAR'S CHAMPION? The Putrid Potentate of Poetry! The Ripsnortin Raja of Rhyme! Yes, the winner of the coveted WORST POEM OF 2010 AWARD goes to Hajid Kirduz Msechnohech, who is awarded our Grand Prize (a copy of How to Goodbye Depression: If You Constrict Anus 100 Times Every Day. Malarky? or Effective Way? which is widely considered to be one of the worst self-published titles in the long history of publishing). Hajid, you were close last year, but this year YOU HAVE WON! Here's hoping you enjoy the book, learn how to erase your bad stickiness, shoot out immaterial fiber, and, most importantly, rotate your vortex (though preferably while there is no one else in the room). For those who missed Hajid's fabulous poem because you couldn't figure out that >> meant you needed to move to the next page of poems, let me paste the whole schlamozzle here for your reading enjoyment:

Greetings and saltations, Uncle Chip sir!

This year I offer heartfelt poem (written out of depths of heart) based on events which recently fell onto me in last year.

Sincerely,
Hajid
www.HajidKirduzMesechnohech.com

* * * *

"Krzjette"
by Hajid Kirduz Mesechnohech

Krzjette, your love for me
was like lowing of she-goats in spring
when bald sparrows
alight on budding bushes.

But your father,
like stealer of one-footed man's sandal,
he stood between us.
(He is large man.)

He betrothed you to another,
Ringtu the seller
of discount carpets.
And him you wed.

Now I stand
like camel lost in desert,
like beggar on street,
like sultan without mustache.

Tray of dates is prepared,
but falls into camel's trough.
DuckTales marathon is broadcast,
but elder cousin's television not working.

Winter has come.
But until spring I wait.
Lowing of she-goats
will come again.

Posted by: Hajid Kirduz Mesechnohech 

Thanks for everyone for competing. You are all fabulous. Now... it's back to publishing. 

-chip

Bad Poetry ends on Tuesday!

So here's your last reminder... Tuesday is my birthday, and the last official day to enter our annual Bad Poetry Contest. The next day we'll pick a winner, and go back to answering your questions about books and publishing. If you'd like to jump in, today's the day. Just jump to the "comments" section and offer your worst. -chip

The 2010 Bad Poetry Contest continues!

Your entries are not being erased! At the bottom of the "comments" section is a small arrow in gold (looks like this: >> ). Just click on that and it'll take you to the next section of bad poetry. Sorry -- I do my blog on typepad, and people always have a hard time figuring out why their comment doesn't show up. They think I erased them, but I erase nothing. Join in -- go to the comments section and send us your bad poem! -chip

The 2010 Bad Poetry Contest

Bad poetry lives!

That's right, the time has come once again to put away childish things and break out with verbal arm farts. Stop the wordsmithing madness and start constipating on wrong rhythms and awful word choice. The 2010 Bad Poetry Contest is here. 

For those not in the know, we deal with books and publishing 51 weeks out of the year, answering questions and offering insights to writers and those interested in the world of publishing. But one week out of the year (my birthday week), we set aside the topic of publishing in order to share something much deeper... much more meaningful... and very stupid. In the old British tradition of offering something falsely deep yet with a veneer of thoughtfulness, we hold a Bad Poetry Contest. Each year the readers send in truly horrible poetry, then a team of experts (me...and sometimes Mike, if he's sober and I can convince him to help) offers a thorough evaluation of each piece ("That sucks... but this sucks worse."). Eventually we come up with a winner, who is presented with a truly fabulous Grand Prize. One year it was a 45 record of Neil Diamond singing "I Am, I Said" (which contains these deep thoughts: "I am, i said, to no one there, and no one heard at all not even the chair." Wow. Sing to me, Neil.) Another year it was a very special book that had been sent to me in hopes of finding representation: Does God Speak Through Cats?  You see the theme here? We go for a mood of deepfulness and reflectivosity. And YOU need to participate. 

This year's Grand Prize? A copy of what has been called "the worst self-published book ever." How to Good-bye Depression is the product of that great writing mind Hiroyuki Nishigaki, who added to its fame by creating this winning subtitle: If You Constrict Anus 100 Times Every Day. Malarky? or Effective Way? (No, I'm not making this up. That's the subtitle. Complete with punctuation errors.) Chapters of the book include Erase your bad stickiness and multiply various good feeling, Save sex energy and rotate vortex, and my favorite chapter, Stare, shoot out immaterial fiber, uceed in concentrating, behave with abandon-largess-humor, and beckon the spirit. (I checked to make sure I had that one exactly as published -- right down to the word "uceed.") Let me just point out that I'm not only a huge fan of this book, I've long been in favor of rotating your vortex. I'm not as big on shooting out immaterial fiber, unless you're out-of-doors and wearing the proper headgear. Anyway, this book can be ALL YOURS if you win the 2010 Bad Poetry Contest. So don't delay, brethren and sisteren. 

Some rules:

1. Don't send me a birthday poem, unless you want me to slug you. Yeah, this is my way of celebrating. But "Happy Birthday oh Chip o' mine, Hope this finds you well and fine" gets tired in a hurry. 

2. Um... I don't know if there ARE any other rules. I mean, you create a crappy poem and post it in the "comments" section of this blog. How hard can that be? Any kind of poem is fine. Free verse, rhyming couplets, limericks -- the key is that it needs to be BAD. (And by "bad" we don't just mean "sort of stoopid." We mean "falsely deep," "annoyingly awful," and "please-shoot-me-before-I-write-some-more treacle.") We're looking for bad imagery. Incorrect word choice. Irresponsible concepts. Awful metaphors. Smarmy tripe. We don't just want dumb cutesyness -- we want mind-numbingly BAD poetry! 

So put on your stinking cap, and think up something rotten. It's a tough job, but SOMEbody's got to create bad poetry. You have been chosen. Feed your gift. The contest starts... NOW.

Brother Chip MacGregor

MacGregor Literary and Poetry Society

And the winner is...

Wow. I must say, there are a LOT of bad poets out there. In case you didn't read them, this year's entries in our annual Bad Poetry Contest brought us verses about dead cats, naked cucumbers, and constipation (keep pushing, anita). Jimmy Jacobson brought us zombies, and one deep thinker offered his thoughts on "Ned the Hamster." Sensitive and reflective author Cathy West, ruminating on the industry, penned these moving words: Dear Writer, as you think you are, I shall tell you kindly from afar, You Suck. You're awful. Terrible. And you stink too." 

It's exactly that type of thoughtful work that has made my annual Bad Poetry Contest such a popular stop for those people in the industry with serious drug problems -- er, I mean, for people in the industry with a serious appreciation for deep and meaningful what-have-you. If you're not aware, I do this every year the week of my birthday, and it's turned into a spiritually enriching time for people to write things such as Sina'i's deep thoughts on life: Puppies. Rainbows. Golden poop. 

That's it. The entire poem. I have no idea what it actually means, but in my life I've had my share of each -- sometimes all at once, I suppose. And it's that sort of mindless tripe our college lit professors drilled into us, explaining how the words of sensitive poets reach out across the miles to unite us all in, um, something. (I could never stay awake in poetry class, so I'm not sure what it's uniting us in. World peace, or membership in the Trilateral Commission or something. But that's not the point.) The point is that we got to see some really, really bad poetry here. 

Oh sure -- there were some folks who don't get it. There are those who are purposefully funny. Some write bad country-western lyrics. Others feel a deep need to write something akin to "Chip's birthday makes him so old, I hope my poem is really bold." Those people won't win THIS poetry contest. (Those people will no doubt wind up in hell, but that's for another blog.) The best bad poetry is reflective but purposefully shallow. Thoughtful, but only for someone with the brains of a cocker spaniel. It takes itself seriously, but doesn't seem to realize the rest of the world thinks it was written by a thirteen-year-old girl. And it's THESE folks who stood out in a crowd, declaring, "I'm a bad poet, and I want the world to know!"

So, after much debate and a couple very tasty birthday margaritas, I present to you our TOP TEN BAD POEMS OF 2009...

10. Nicole's The Bad Dump was not only truly wretched, it contained this image: 

Now I lie on the heap with the refuse of other broken hearts.

Shredded plastic bags and full diapers.

Dumped like me. 

Not everyone can offer such a tasteless picture. It will long be there, lodged like a stone in the kidney of my mind. Nice work, Nicole.

9. I really wanted to give this spot to my daughter, Molly MacGregor, who brought us an epic poem from Iceland (a country she's never visited), or to my sister, Cindy MacGregor, who has been to Iceland but, for reasons I'll never know, chose instead to write references to Frank Zappa's "Moving to Montana." However, new Federal Bad Poetry Laws prohibit me from offering them a spot on my top ten list. So instead, this will have to go to Daniel Gereige, who lives in Australia and couldn't figure out that the Annual Bad Poetry Contest is a joke. So he wrote in to tell us all to buy a copy of his new book,which he said contains "deeply enlightened poetry." I just want you to stop and think about that for a moment... He's so remarkable dense he thought this contest was worth joining to enhance his career, but he claims to have written something that's not only enlightened, but DEEPLY enlightened. Uh-huh. I'm hoping by now his mom has taken him aside and explained all this to him. You win the stupid award. 

8. Any poem that contains such thoughts as "I'm deeper than the stain Embedded deep in the carpet" is sure to capture some attention, and Melissa Kerkhoff's paean to her own wonderfulness reminds me of being back at Patrick T. Brown Junior High. As she puts it to eloquently, "I'm not bound by simple rules Like poetry having consistent rhythm and rhyme." You rock, gurlfriend!

7. The fake depth and underlying anger of Stephen came out extraordinarily bad in his poem for the advent season: "Endless, endless are the tears that drop like sweet and sour sauce from an overfilled plate on the long walk between buffet line and a corner table where I sit alone." Not only does he promise to form words "with Scrabble tiles and hot-glue each word to your cubicle wall," but he offers this profound bit of cultural insight: "Sighing, sighing, sighing, sighing, and then finally remembering to inhale to keep from fainting like a first-time author on Oprah's couch." Terrible. Really bad. I salute you, Stephen. 

6. In the top group must be included the melodious meanderings of Hajid Kirduz Mesechnohech, who brought us this bit of doggerel: 

Then did Hajid lace up sneakers,

take swig of fermented goatsmilk,

and straighten best red-tasseled hat.

He took wooden harp from pack and 

began to sing song of salt and

barbed cockroach of Adlu-Haziz.

Soon Bildar was weeping like small

castrated goatling. "Please stay and 

sing songs all my days," he outcried.

"Nay," spake Hajid. "But you can buy

book or CD from my website." 

Then handed business card to snake.

I think we all can pretend to get a deep and meaningful lesson from those words. [insert nod here]

5. Demain Farnworth's The Don Juan of Motor City made everyone's top five. The judges were particularly impressed with his deep imagery: "I'm spicy like taco meat." Nice.

4. Last year's winner, MEC, came back with another bit of adolescent-inspired meaningfulness, including these lines:

I was me, so was she,

that dead body in the car.

I could not understand

why they left her alone

so long they forgot her

and she died right there

and only a few rings on her toes

to identify who she was.

I liked the heart one best. 

Not bad enough to win our Grand Prize, but a really awful poem none the less, MEC.

 3. Kay Day won third place by bringing a sensitive note to the proceedings with:

Someday I will once again

walk in the brightness

of happiness

I will walk like a girl who is happy

like a girl with ballet slippers on her feet

and I will think only of love and joy

rainbows and kittens

Someday when my precious boy stops puking. 

Awful! A Truly Bad Poem, Kay. Fabulously bad. Thanks for your participation. 

2. In second place (and it's always important to have a strong second place finisher, since should our first place winner be unable to fulfill the demands we place on the champion, the second place person is responsible to poke fun at the schmuck) is the immortal Fred Gippler, for this total stinker: 

Blue

The color of rainbows.

The color of her soft lips as she drove us to Taco Bell.

That

Last 

Time

Never forgotten, the moment, frozen in the infinite voice of space, as she chewed

the chalupa:

"Jim, I don't love you."

My name was Tony.

Couldn't.

Finish.

My Seven Layer Burrito. 

The statement couldn't be taken back -- it stood there between us, as real and solid

as a unicorn. 

Bean dip dripped from her malformed chin onto my uncle's Gameboy.

My

Finnish

Uncle

Travis was his name.

My name was Tony.

There's something deeply stupid about that poem, so that it just sort of stays with you. Keep taking the medicine, Fred. 

1. And now, the moment you've all been waiting for, the winner of our Grand Prize (which this year is a lava lamp from Spencer Gifts)... RON BENSON for his truly retch-inducing poem about fish! Here it is, in case you missed it and need something to help you lose that lunch:

Walleye eludes me.

Slimy catfish, full of industrial toxins, jump at my lures.

Sucker carp, all bulding doleful eyes and slate brick scales, raise their fins to beg,

"Catch me! Catch me!"

A bluegill volunteers itself. Surrenders to my will.

But my heart is not satisfied. 

Walleye eludes me.

Why, oh why did I pay ten dollars

to register for the Freeland Walleye Festival Fishing Tournament?

Why, oh why did it rain all day that Friday?

Why, oh why did my nightcrawlers overheat in the car window,

congealing into a mass of gray flesh,

taunting me with their lifeless forms,

laughing from their Purgatory of worms?

Walleye eludes me. 

My wife says, "Curse the walleye and die!"

But I've spent too much already.

The license

The rod and reel

The tackle and the box to hold it

The really, really big boat

I must fight on. I must endure. I must be victorious. I must. 

Others pass by on the right and on the left.

They hoist their larder high, rubbing it in my face. 

"They're biting tonight!" they shout.

"You can catch 'em in your hands!" they scream. 

"My two-year-old caught a ten pounder!" one particularly large round specimen brags.

I fantasize about big hooks and poles

Big stinky fishermen being landed with big nets,

De-scaled, gutted, coated with corn meal and friend delicately. 

Walleye eludes me. 

Consider the deepfulness. Ponder the reflectivosity. Meditate on how long the guy worked on a Really Bad Poem. I'm WITH you, Ron -- walleye eludes me, too, and I don't even fish. And that's why you're the winner of this year's grand prize. The lava lamp will NOT elude you, my friend. You are the 2009 Bad Poetry Champion. Take your bow. 

chip

The 2009 Bad Poetry Contest Continues

This is the place for bad poetry. In case you're wondering what it is we're doing, we take one week out of each year (the week of my birthday) and try something different. Normally authors are sending in questions about writing and publishing, and I try to bring some wisdom to bear on the issue at hand. But the first week of May we set aside to share one of my stupid passions -- bad poetry. I don't mean poetry that is simply juvenile or moronic, but the kind that offers faux depth, atrocious metaphors, and really stupid self-awareness. 

Some poems will be well designed, like this example from novelist Ginger Garrett:

Ode To A Fallen Friend

O, gentle green frog
Now spreading red
Five miles per hour was fast
Enough

Others will focus on deepfulness and reflectivosity, such as this nice bit of barfiness from Kay Day: 

my heart is heavy
weighed down like it has a big boulder from Rocky Mountain National Park on it
It pulls me down into a pit of sorrow and sadness
like a well full of tears and sadness
The sun is shining like a super bright star
but in my heart
it is black
like darkness without the sun

Someday I will once again
walk in the brightness 
of happiness
I will walk like a girl who is happy
like a girl with ballet slippers on her feet
and I will think only of love and joy
rainbows and kittens

Someday when my precious boy stops puking. 

Wonderfully bad! The longing, the desire, the pondering vomit. A fabulously bad bit of poetry. Or consider this piece of existential BS from the aptly-named Fred Gippler:

Blue
The color of rainbows. 
The color of her soft lips as she drove us to Taco Bell.
That
Last
Time
Never forgotten, the moment, frozen in the infinite void of space, as she chewed the chalupa: 
"Jim, I don't love you."
My name was Tony.
Couldn't.
Finish.
My Seven Layer Burrito.
The statement couldn't be taken back--it stood there between us, as real and solid as a unicorn.
Bean dip dripped from her malformed chin onto my uncle's GameBoy.
My
Finnish
Uncle
Travis was his name.
My name was Tony.

This sort of truly bad art doesn't come along every week (thank God).  A close look at submissions this year will turn up such great titles as "The Ballad of Ned the Hamster" and "The Don Juan of Motor City" (which offer the vomitous line, "I'm spicy like taco meat"). Past wieners of the contest have included "Blind Puppy on the Freeway" and "Doctor Jesus." And today you can join this illustrious company. 

So... it's your turn. Go to the "comments" section and type some tripe. Feel free to check the last post for all the truly awful bits of doggerel that have come before you. Don't feel you have to write about writing. And don't write me a birthday poem. Just sit down, take some drugs, and start constipating. You'll be entering the great brotherhood of Bad Poets. And, as announced today on national TV, this year's winner will receive a genuine Spencer Gifts Lava Lamp. As Bob Eubanks likes to say, "a grand prize selected ESPECIALLY for you." Don't just sit there -- begin thy bad poetics! 

(Oh, and a note... if you get to the end of the "comments" section, you'll see a faint arrow. Clicking on that will take you to the next page of bad poems. Several people have written to say they can't find the arrow, so they can only read the first few submissions. Those people have clearly been drinking heavily. Slow down. This isn't a race, it's a meandering walk through the warped minds of creative nutjobs. Enjoy yourself.)

Chip 

Announcing the 2009 Bad Poetry Contest

In the lobby of the Deadham Community Theater is a painting of a bald man, done all in greens and grays, with mushrooms floating in the air all around him. One look at it makes you think, "Wow... this is BAD." 

And that's exactly what it is, since the painting hangs in The Museum of Bad Art, located in a theater lobby in Deadham, Massachusetts. It's proven so popular the curator has opened a second venue, at the Somerville Theater, just outside Cambridge. There are bad portraits, wild colors, out-of-sync angles, and even a shockingly bad copy of the Mona Lisa, done in bright green and magenta, with what appears to be Frankenstein in a dress. (The title? Mana Lisa.) 

Interviewed recently in American Way Magazine, Louise Reilly Sacco, the Permanent Acting Interim Executive Director of the Museum of Bad Art, was quick to explain that not everything can be easily labeled "bad." For example, cutesy tourist art doesn't qualify, nor does simple paint-by-numbers stuff, children's art, or the prints you buy at K-Mart. And having no talent apparently disqualifies you from creating "truly bad," since anyone who has attended a karaoke bar knows there is a difference between lacking ability and true awfulness."From the works of talented artists that have gone awry to works of exuberant, although crude , execution by artists barely in control of the brush," noted Sacco in her interview, "what they all have in common is a special quality that sets them apart in one way or another from the merely incompetent." Badness, thy name is faux depth.

In other words, to create genuine Bad Art, one must have some sort of Bad Artistic Vision, and take it seriously, and study the craft... and THEN still produce a pile of poop. THAT is what we can call truly bad art. And it is in that spirit that I announce our annual Bad Poetry Contest of 2009! For those not in the know, we do this every May, as a way to celebrate my birthday. Just go to the bottom of this blog, hit "comment," and post some lousy bit of doggerel. The goal is not to send me a stupid birthday poem ("Happy Birthday, o' Chip o' mine, Hope this finds you well and fine..."), but to get writers to use their creative talents to explore the depth of true awfulness. We want over-the-top emotion. Bad metaphors. Deepfulness. Reflectivosity. Show us that poetic bent!

This contest has grown out of my belief that inside every poet is the same message, which can subtly be summed up this way: Hey! Look at me! I'm sensitive and nobody understands me! So I'll show you how deep I am by writing some poetry! 

Well don't worry, my deep and meaningful friends -- Uncle Chippy is here for you. In fact, I was also once accused of being sensitive and artistic, until I grew up and stopped whining. Therefore, I've set aside this week just for you. Right now, YOU can be published! ON MY BLOG! Just think of it... You can sit down, create, contemplate your navel, and, um, do whatever it is poets do while the rest of us are out earning a living (take drugs? watch reruns of Law And Order?). Then send it in and you're entered in the contest. Everything counts -- your cutesy couplets, horrible haiku, retch-producing refrains. Write and send, my dear ones. 

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled metaphors yearning to breathe free. The hopeless haiku of your teeming shore, etc etc. Lift that lamp beside the golden door and write something. Don't delay! Start constipating now! We only do this for a week, once a year. And the best news of all: The winner, chosen each year by a team of experts (consisting of my best friend Mike and I, usually after drinking too much Guinness), will receive a GRAND PRIZE: A genuine Lava Lamp from Spencer Gifts! Something that sort of sums up the whole Bad Art experience! Try to contain your excitement. 

Last year's winner brought us a very hip "Jesus Rap," that included these immortal words:

Dr. Jesus
I'm feeling ill
How about you give me
A salvation pill?

He said to me
that very day
with me in your life
you'll be A-OKAY!

The winning author was only 23 years old (though I know you'll find that hard to believe). It's exactly those sorts of life-changing lyrics that makes me believe in the future of Bad Art. (sniff. honk!) Oh...please keep in mind that there are only a handful of words that rhyme with love. The short lists includes dove, glove, shove, above, and right-ho-guv. Note that anyone using the word "wuv" as child's version of "love" will be hunted down and forced to read the Complete Works of Dan Brown. 

So you're on the clock. There'll be no more questions about proposals. No reflecting on the Google settlement this week. No more posting about how wonderful our Hero President Bush was. We give that all a rest for a few days, as we enter Bad Poetry Week. Join us! Go to the "comments" section and send us your best (or your worst, depending).

Chip (who is about to hit 51)

 

PS: In case you're really a poet, and you've missed the point here, we're looking for BAD poetry. The more hideous, smarmy, self-righteous, sappy, or obtuse, the better. Don't expect me to represent it -- if you're too sensitive to notice, there's no money to be made in poetry, so my looking at your crud won't do you any good in the market. Sorry.

And the winner is...

So today is my birthday -- I hit the big Five-Oh, and I'm celebrating by holding my nose and pouring over all the really bad poetry that faithful readers have sent to my 2008 Bad Poetry Contest. My friends took me to J.K. O'Donnel's Irish Pub for some inspiration, so let me offer some quick thoughts...

-Most of you really suck at this. I mean, really. You're great sports for taking part, of course, but you need to know that poetry is not in your future. Trust me on this.

-A few rose above the badness and actually had nice rhymes and good images. You were immediately disqualified. (My son Colin sent in a 28-liner that actually rhymed and offered the image of "this violent reek in my nose hair." Sorry, son, but to craft truly BAD poetry you'd have skipped the rhyme and focused more on the cat poo.)

-Why is it that limericks make us smile? And why is it that nobody can really take a limerick seriously? I mean, Shakespeare never wrote limericks, did he? ("Forsooth and anon from Nantucket...")

-When will bad poets realize that rhyming couplets get really annoying after the first two lines? Egad. Once I got by the lines like "Happy Birthday Chipperoo, You are really full of poo," I wanted to smack the author with a stick. (Take note, Paulette Harris: "Happy birthday to you, woo woo woo" is not actually a "poem" -- it's more like a "bad idea.")

-While I'm at it, when will poets realize that most haiku is awful? I mean, the faux depth is laughable. Just creating the dumbest haiku imaginable will probably put you into the Poetry Hall of Fame.

-I'd like to point out that Kelly Klepfer offered us a rap. A RAP! Kelly will be mistaken for a rapper the day after PEOPLE Magazine names me to their list of "50 Sexiest Men." White people cannot rap, Dawg, no matter how many eminem CD's you own. More on this subject later.

- I'd also like to point out that I had to disqualify my own daughter, Molly MacGregor, for bringing up Ralph Nader during an election season. See rule 48b(6). Oh, and I disqualfied Jim Rubart just on principle, for being a Washington Husky. (I'm an Oregon Duck, Jim. Wake up, man. The Huskies went 1 and 10 last year.)

-Though she didn't win, it's clear that Pam Halter has a nice way with words: "she smooshes us up and stuffs us down her baby's throats." Lovely. Truly bad. And M.L. Eqatin offered some great deep thoughts on the role of meter that, well, helped me to see you were in the spirit of things. And Tiffany Colter's Ode to Casserole, while too cutesy to win, still was awful. I salute you. One more: Ashley Weis penned something really foul: "Oh speak into my ear, what's that I hear? The owl, the owl, Mr. Rowel." Um... Mr. Rowel? He was your sophomore English teacher, and this is how you pay him back, by sticking him into a bad poetry contest? Nice work!

Okay, so it's on to the winners!

HONORABLE MENTION must go to John Robinson, who apparently was mixing his prescriptions again. Your "Monkey In a Cage" is genuinely wretched. You're a pro at this. And Janet's ode to "Little Debbie" brought a smile to my face. Wonderfully bad. A Forward's use of "Obama, Osama, Oprah, Yo Mama" was an exceptionally rotten use of rhyme.

WORST HAIKU: An easy choice. Robert Treskillard sent this bit of deepfulness:

Walk on marshmallows
Or run fingers through the mud
That is not banjo

Yeah, bay-bee! Now THAT is bad poetry!

This year's WORST IMAGE ribbon goes to Linda Shab's Snot Bubbles and Tears, which left me reaching for a kleenex...

Snot Bubbles and Tears…
Where are you?
My phone doesn’t ring
The doorbell doesn’t chime.
My lips can’t sing.
I’m a mime.
Just a mime.
But my heart cries out!
The snot bubbles ooze from the chambers.
They mix with my tears -
Enough to drown me.
But that’s probably what you want….
Right?
I thought we had something special.
But I guess I was wrong.
So wrong.
What will I do now?
I’ll sit in sorrow
Until tomorrow.
Then I’ll get up and move on
With my empty life.
If the snot bubbles and tears don’t drown me first.

Wow. As bad poetry goes, that is a winner.

THE WORST REFLECTION ON LIFE AWARD goes to Alison Morrow in a landslide. I won't share the whole thing, but any poem that offers the first few lines as "I, Yes I, I and not you, or u" reveals the true reflectivosity needed in a bad poet. You're my hero, Alison. What a deep thinker.

Our MOST CREATIVE BAD POEM was no doubt developed after a bad migraine by Lisa Samson, who wrote a love ditty that went, in part,

Or maybe if we were on a base 8
System and a quarter
Was worth twenty cents,
And we were each worth ten
Cents.
Cents! You left me and it makes
No cents!

Have you ever known anyone to craft a love poem around a base 8 numerical system? Me neither. Thank God.

This year's coveted CLEARLY ON DRUGS WHILE WRITING award goes to your favorite traditional tale-teller, Hajid Kirduz Mesechnohech, who gave us this bit o' badness:

Rejection is like the salt from lake Mizzri
(imagine here strumming and goatsounds)
rubbed on a wounded and festersome foot,
which was stung by barbed cockroach of Aldu-Haziz.
The roach snuck into your sandal the day
when you planned to set out for new lunar feast
wearing your favored red-tasseled hat

Amen to THAT, Hajid! Your poem had all the sweetness of the secretions of the she-goat as it is rubbed on the festersome foot. And Ducktales is sure to be interested in the movie rights.

Okay, SECOND RUNNER UP goes to Fred Gippler for his truly awful poem, No, It Is Not My Bagel:

NO!! IT IS NOT MY BAGEL
she sang lustily.
Why. Dreams. Memories. Fred Savage, star of Television's "The Wonder Years". A blue snow cone from May, 1977. Dreams again. Dinosaurs. Dreams one more time. Again; dreams.
Wow.
I hate your grandma--and. AND? AAAANNNDDDD!?!?!?!

And it is not my bagel, she sang, falling backwards into a future of stale tacos and unclosable milk jugs.

Let's face it, there's just something deeply stupid about that poem. Not just run-of-the-mill stupid, but in-your-face-disgrace sort of stupid. Love it! Exactly what I needed to see in bad poetry.

The FIRST RUNNER UP, who is very important, since if our champion cannot represent us on some random blogs that nobody ever visits, the FIRST RUNNER UP will be expected to take her place and pretend to be sober, goes to Darcie Gudger, for sending in these words:

Bad poetry.
Like, really, really bad.
Airplanes buzz around my cranium -
....with tootsie roll thoughts.

Poet laureates.
Say lor-ee-ates in the containium.
I mean continuum.

Free the monkeys!
Now!
I mean it!

Now THERE is a woman who understands the meaning of genuinely bad poetry. She offers bad rhymes, bad images, and even some mindless, off-topic shouts from the political left. Yes! THANK YOU for understanding what we're doing here.

And THE WINNER, THE GRAND CHAMPION, THE BAD POET LAUREATE FOR 2008, is none other than Holly MacGregor (um...she really is no relation to "Molly MacGregor," except through marriage). Stay with me before rolling your eyes. First, this is a real poem she wrote. No kidding. Granted, she was a sophomore in a Christian high school at the time, but still -- it reeks of true badness. And second, she admitted to the world that she actually wrote this -- and then she SAVED it since high school. I thought about giving her the award on bravery alone. But third, I have it on good authority that she actually once performed this in a classroom. Which leads me to reiterate a point I made earlier: White people can't rap. Especially someone like Holly, who doesn't exactly exude "street cred," since she is roughly as white as a trout's belly and is going to school to be an aesthetist (which, you've got to admit, is not your normal job for a rap artist...you down wi' dat?).  Here is her poem:

Dr. Jesus
I'm feeling ill
How about you give me
A salvation pill?

He said to me
that very day
with me in your life
you'll be A-OKAY!

I need a Christ Transfusion
Pump his blood into my veins
Take out the old
And make me new again
Give him my life
So he can take the reins!

Dr. Jesus
I feeling well
That pill you gave me
Sure is Swell!

Okay, so she's married to my son, and I love her dearly. But Holly, that rap is horrid. Bad lyrics, stupid images, lack of depth... all the qualities we look for in bad poetry, and the reason you are our BAD POETRY CHAMPION OF 2008. Your prize is a genuine copy of Does God Speak Through Cats?, a self-published book that, frankly, I don't want any more. So it's yours, you lucky girl!

Thanks to everyone who contributed. Next year I hope to have even more great prizes I don't want, so I'll give them to someone else.

The 2008 Bad Poetry Contest is still going on...

Don't wait until the last minute -- now's your chance to show off that lack of talent!

Give us your wretched rhymes, your lousy limericks, your hurtin' haiku. Every year at this time I celebrate my birthday by hosting the Bad Poetry Contest. We've got some absolute stinkers this year -- poems about monkeys in cages, acrostics about casseroles,  and "fearsome fanged sparrows from the cliffs of Aldu-Hazziz." In other words, these are bad. Terrible. Rotten to the core. Just the way we like 'em. We even had one woman reveal that the love of her life looked her in the eye and told her, "They look like big blue bowling balls." (Um... it should be noted she THOUGHT the guy was talking to her about her eyes.) And to top it off, two of my students took time away from their end-of-the-semster studies to rhyme "final" with "vinyl." Does my heart proud to know I'm discipling two young up-and-coming bad poets.

Last year's winner was "Blind Puppy on a Freeway," which offered this inspiring chorus:

Love, love, love, love

Love, love, love

Love.

I don't know. Whenever I read those words (sniff), there's just something (sniff) that touches me (snort) RIGHT HERE (honk!). [For the sake of potential children reading this blog, we won't be showing pictures.]

Anyway, here's your chance. Rage. Emote. Show us your deepfulness. Greatness awaits. (So does a copy of Does God Speak Through Cats, which is this year's Grand Prize Selected Especially For You.) My 50th Birthday is Sunday, when I hope to be picking a winner, assuming I can still read and I'm not overcome by the fumes.

Poem away!