This is a post promising another post. I have one simmering in my mind — negative capability! Jung! Poetry! — but I also have an avalanche of papers to grade. In the meantime, I thought I’d give a peak into my poetry workshop. We’re discussing meter at the moment, which always seems to be the most intimidating and frustrating subject to cover in a poetry class. As such, I always try to introduce two important forms: the clerihew and the limerick. Somehow, meter isn’t as frustrating when it’s used to make fun of people. 
Observe this clerihew, by Stephanie Boxx, a student in my poetry class, which made me laugh when I greatly needed to laugh:
Emma Bolden
to her cats was beholden.
She thought they perfect could be-
until on her best green boots they did pee.
See? Poetry’s not so stuffy after all. Though I do wish those green boots were spotless …
Not the offending feline in question, but still perhaps the best photo of one of my cats.
Emma Bolden is the author of How To Recognize A Lady, a chapbook of poems published as part of Edge by Edge, the third in Toadlily Press' Quartet Series, and The Mariner's Wife, a chapbook published by Finishing Line Press. Her third chapbook, The Sad Epistles, is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press. She was the recipient of a Tennessee Williams Scholarship to the Sewanee Writers' Conference and was named a Finalist for a Ruth Lilly Fellowship by the Poetry Foundation/Poetry magazine. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in such journals as Prairie Schooner, the Indiana Review, Feminist Studies, The Journal, Redivider, The Greensboro Review, and Verse. Her manuscript was a semi-finalist for the Perugia Press Prize. She is a Visiting Assistant Professor of English at Georgetown College, where she also serves as the poetry editor of the Georgetown Review.
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October 29, 2009 at 12:53 am
jessiecarty
yes, she must have her toys
worst pee offense of one of my cats? peeing on Modern Life by Matthea Harvey. NOOO!!! Had to buy a new copy.
And I wish someone could teach me how to scan. I just have never been able to do it
October 29, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Chantel
Wait, you have GREEN BOOTS? Yet another reason to wish I were you.
October 29, 2009 at 1:22 pm
mariegauthier
Did you read The Anthologist by Nicholson Baker? A large part of it consists of the narrator explicating his theories about scansion & meter — not only is it interesting, but I think he’s right.
If there’s a better dressed, more stylish prof than you, I don’t know her…
October 29, 2009 at 8:07 pm
Edward Morningstar
Jung! I hope for an extended commentary on the Red Book.
November 6, 2009 at 3:51 pm
emmabolden
Jessie — NO! That’s awful. I’ve had to hide all the good books, as Alice is a shredder.
Chantel — ZOMG yes. They are amazing. 6PM.COM!
Marie — NO! I’ll have to check it out. And most profs are better dressed than I am — I just allow being a poet to give me license to wear bizarre shoes!
Edward, my dearest, you guessed it! The commentary can’t be too extended, sadly, as I don’t have the $120 necessary … One day, that book will be mine!