The Poetry Course

I was stumbling through the college grounds

On a day, eight months ago,

It was wintertime, in a fading light

And the ground was covered with snow,

I was there for a course of literature

Set up by Professor Burke,

They said that he had all the answers, then,

To the Poets, and all of their work!

 

I’d never read too much poetry

What I had went over my head,

I thought there was too much imagery

To understand what they said,

The class was small, I sat by the wall

And tried to avoid his frown,

Whenever he asked a question

I was afraid that he’d put me down.

 

I didn’t know anyone else in there

I was feeling bereft, alone,

But one of the students that sat by me

Had a face that was set in stone,

He was shrunk right down in his overcoat,

And he sat there, stroking his mo,

So after the class, I followed him

And he gave me a brief: ‘Hello!’

 

I can’t ever say that we were chums,

He was far too quiet for that,

We’d wander together, lost in thought

And I was the one to chat,

He’d answer me with a short ‘Hurrumph’,

Occasionally answer: ‘Hah!’

And often he’d sound almost profound

With a short and considered: ‘Bah!’

 

The only time that he came to life

Was when Burke was discussing Rhyme,

Burke curled his lip at the thought of it,

And said: ‘It’s a waste of time!’

My friend sank down in his overcoat

And he gave out a funny sigh,

With Burke extolling the free-form art

Of the moderns, and told us why.

 

He tore up Coleridge: ‘Christabel,

Is just an unfinished dream,

And Wordsworth, him and his leeches - Well!

It seems to me quite obscene!’

He massacred Noyes and his ‘Highwayman’,

And Kipling he threw in the bin;

‘‘The Raven’ is boring, it’s much too long

And the rest of his stuff, just spin!’

 

Exams were held on a frosty night

With a hell of a fog outside,

My friend was down and dispirited,

But he wrote with a quiet pride,

The final question on rhyme was set

On ‘The Raven’ - give a critique!’

I think he would still have been writing there

If we’d had ‘til the end of the week!

 

The marks came back in a day or two,

I’d scrambled through with a pass,

My friend walked off on his own that night

His shoulders were hunched at the last,

I never ran into him after that,

He’d said, ‘I’d better just go!’

The marks for ‘The Raven’ had let him down,

They’d flunked Edgar Allan Poe!

 

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[poeticpiers]

What annoys me is the experts who claim to know what the poet really meant.
Poets write about life as they see it in their environment in their time.
Experts are invariably totally wrong in their opinions but merely pass on what some other expert has said. What you or I write into a poem will not be read in the same way by two readers. Readers relate to their own life experiences and some times astonish the writer with their interpretations

[Erin Thomas]

Exactly. That is why there is no science or math to poetry. It is not exact or precise, it is whatever the write makes it which will be different to the reader!

[Dinesh Sairam]

The problem is, they should start teaching children prosody and meter at a young age, and not only rhyme. In fact, meter is the music of the poem and is very important to them than rhyme.

Kids who grow up with reading just rhymes seem to think that free verse or non-rhyming verse is more 'mature'. Bullshit, I say.

[Tate Morgan]

Ill second that.More mature could easily equate to lazy.To create a rhyming metered verse Is extremely hard .If it were easy everyone would do it.It is exactly that tribulation that makes it special ,that makes a verse sentient.

[BlackRose]

I so agree with these others here. It's your poetry and how you write it. How you want it to read and be read by others. It's your style, being you and not someone else. I have had some critique mine to the hilt, I still knowing it's just as good as anyone elses. And we don't expect everyone to like our works or everyone one of them or anyone else to expect it either for that matter but it's the many many others that like them that will that will count and keep us going strong. I have read many and your poetry so far is one of the very few that I can rave about. LOVE LOVE your work.

[Enid Blake]

Ha Ha, I like this one :) And I was right there in the college grounds smelling the frosty air! Totally empathise with the character in the 2nd verse lol :)

[minisla]

Found this piece humorous and enjoyable

[tynamite]

This is very imaginative. Tongue in cheek too.

[Mark]

ha! I loved this one, taking a poke at established 'experts' with the genius you have for rhythm and rhyme is by itself enough to make me grin. Add in a fanciful story involving another master of that art, EAP was worth a lot of chuckle.

Thank you for the wonderful write. :)

[FocusedAmnesia]

I just love the way you write. I wish I could have my words flow as easily as yours do. Your pieces always talk about [what I have deemed so far] important, and/or strong topics, and read like a song.
And this one, I find so humorous, despite all of the strong opinions the other reviewers have, which I also agree with. You are able to pull it off so well. It's almost indescribable.

[Priyankaabhilaashi]

Good one..!!

[EileenMarie]

This is brilliant! I love it....... great job......

[外人 (Gaiji..]

Very well done, I was surprised to see that your first attitude to poetry was the same as mine ... and there we are, writing poems xD, to use a Brazilian proverb "Quem despreza, compra" (= Who despise "something", buy it). I hate when teachers think they know everything and are not open, especially in a subject like literature, to other opinions ! I'm proud to say I'm an iluminist and to quote the great Voltaire "I don't agree with your opinion, but I'd give my life (do anything) to let you show it" .
Great job =D

[Wendy Seames Garner]

I think rhyming poems are so much more fun and much harder to write successfully. Thank you so much, David, for another wonderful story/poem!

[Alicia Schroeder]

That is sad.. But very greatly written.. :) I think all of us as writters are lucky to have such a gift of expressing ourselves in a way that my not be seen by others or taken differantly.. But to each there own I guess.. lol.. But great write, I really enjoyed this one :)