OK, I promise I won¹t ever do this again, but I had such fun with today¹s
poem from Poets.org that I had to share it with other teachers. They will
let you sign up for a Poem-a-Day email, a great way to celebrate national
Poetry Month.  They even have a daily podcast, with a selected poet reading
his/her own poem.  Also a Readathon.  Great stuff at their website.

    http://www.poets.org/

Also a reminder that Ted Kooser, current poet laureate, will be at OCU,
Petree Auditorium, tomorrow at 8:00 pm ‹ free and open to the public.  I
hope to see some of you there.

Sandra Effinger

------ Forwarded Message
From: <[log in to unmask];>
Date: Tue, 04 Apr 2006 14:28:00 -0400
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Poem A Day: from Poets.org

April 4, 2006      

Today's poem is from William Henry Harrison and Other Poems, just published
by Louisiana State University Press. Reprinted with permission. All rights
reserved. 

One-Word Poem
by David R. Slavitt

Motherless. 

Discussion questions.
1. Is this a joke? And, if so, is it a joke of the poet in which the editor
of the magazine (or, later, the book publisher or the textbook writers) has
conspired? Or is it a joke on the editors and publishers? Is the reader the
audience of the poem?
2. It is regrettable not to have a mother. Is the purpose of the poem to
convey an emotion to the reader? Does the poet suppose that this is the
saddest word in the language? Do you agree or disagree? Can you suggest a
sadder word? 
3. The Supplement to the Oxford English Dictionary gives an alternate
meaning from nineteenth- and twentieth-century Australian slang as an
intensifier, as in ³stone motherless broke.² Can you assume that the poet
knew this? Does this make for an ambiguity in the poem? Does this
information change your emotional response?
4. If the assertion of the single word as a work of art is not a joke, then
what could it mean? Is it a Dada-ist gesture, amusing and cheeky perhaps but
with an underlying seriousness that the poet either invites or defies the
reader to understand?
5. Even if the poet was merely fooling around, does that necessarily
diminish the possible seriousness of the poem?
6. If we acknowledge that this is a work of art, can the author assert
ownership? Is it possible to copyright a one-word poem?
7. In writing a one-word poem, the crucial decision must be which word to
choose and to posit as a work of art. Do you think the poet spent a great
deal of time picking this word? Or did he simply open a dictionary and let
his fingers do the walking? Does that diminish the poem¹s value? Or is it a
kind of bibliomancy?
8. Should the word have been in quotes? Or is it quotes even without being
in quotes? There is a period at the end of the poem. Would it change the
meaning of the poem if there were an exclamation point? Or no punctuation at
all? Would that be a different poem? Better or worse? Or would you like it
more or less? (Are these different questions?)
9. You can almost certainly write‹or ³write²‹a one-word poem. But it would
be difficult for you to get it published‹almost certainly more difficult now
that this one has been published and staked its claim. Is the publication of
a poem a part of the creative act? Had the poet written his poem and put it
away in his desk drawer as Emily Dickinson used to do, would this make it a
different poem? 
10. Some poems we read and some that we particularly like, we memorize. You
have already memorized this one. Do you like it better now? Or are the
questions part of the poem, so that you have not yet memorized it? Will you,
anyway? Do you need to memorize the questions verbatim, or is the idea
enough?
 


 






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