Very Bad Poetry, or, The Yarn that Lied

Ever read this book?

Very Bad Poetry by Ross Petras and Kathryn Petras

I actually bought this book at the University of Nebraska Bookstore when I was in Lincoln visiting a friend who was in Law School there. My friend Paula and I took turns reading from it on the drive back to Minneapolis. In between great, shuddering, tear-inducing gasps of laughter, that is. If I remember correctly, the introduction remarked that it is very easy to write mediocre poetry, but it takes a special talent to be truly, completely and utterly bad.

There are some real gems here. "Ode to a Mammoth Cheese" is one that sticks in my mind. Then there was  "An Elegy to a Dissected Puppy," and "I Found a Corpse with Golden Hair." But the one they deemed the worst poem ever written is "A Tragedy" by Theophilis Marzials. I reproduce it for your reading pleasure now:

Death! Plop.

The barges down in the river flop.

Flop, plop.

Above, beneath.

From the slimy branches the grey drips drop,
As they scraggle black on the thin grey sky,
Where the black cloud rack-hackles drizzle and fly
To the oozy waters, that lounge and flop
On the black scrag piles, where the loose cords plop,
As the raw wind whines in the thin tree-top.

Plop, plop.

And scudding by

The boatmen call out hoy! and hey!
All is running water and sky,

And my head shrieks -- "Stop,"

And my heart shrieks -- "Die."

*          *          *          *          *
My thought is running out of my head;
My love is running out of my heart,
My soul runs after, and leaves me as dead,
For my life runs after to catch them -- and fled
They all are every one! -- and I stand, and start,
At the water that oozes up, plop and plop,
On the barges that flop
                              And dizzy me dead.
I might reel and drop.
                                                Plop.
                                                Dead. 
And the shrill wind whines in the thin tree-top
                           Flop, plop.

 A tragedy, indeed.

 
Sock knitting continues apace, and I am waiting for some drool-worthy sock yarn I bought on Etsy. I wanted to make some warm wool socks for myself and I had some worsted weight wool called "Poems." I bought it at an undisclosed LYS (not Gabriella's!) and thought it rather pretty. I'm a sucker for pink and green and I bought these two skeins that showed dark limey green and hot pink. It was kind of bright, but I thought I could do something funky with it. I pulled it out last week and started knitting with it. And lo and behold, I have for you Very Bad Socks:

Do you see that? The skein was only half pink and green. After that it turned rusty orange and then blue! And the second skein didn't even start in the same place so the socks don't even match each other. They are the ugliest socks in all of creation.

The yarn lied to me. I was incensed when I unwrapped the orange! Who puts these colors together? I looked them up on the Internet and it said "Poems" is made by Universal Yarns and features artistic colors which shade easily from one color to the next! I think I have found yarn that is not just mediocre. It is bad. It is ugly! They are the yarn equivalent of Theophilus Marzials' poetic creations. The yarn itself is nice, and I will wear the socks around the house because the are warm and rather soft. But these suckers will never see the light of day. They are meant to be worn in the dark.

Don't stare too long - it could burn out your retinas.