Showing posts with label newspapers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label newspapers. Show all posts

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Found-Poem Finale For April


(image: badger, not greasy)
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Well, I had several poems in mind to post on this last day of write-a-poem-a-day month, a.k.a National Poetry Month.
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Then I read the newspaper this morning--the Tacoma News Tribune, which, like all newspapers, is getting smaller all the time, it seems. On page three of the first section, political writer Peter Callaghan had a piece on local building-codes and developers.
Here is one quotation from that piece: "Which is where the 'greasy badgers' came in. That's the phrase architect David Boe, the vice chairman of the [planning] commisssion, used to describe the ornery animals he sometimes has as clients (figuratively, I hope). They ask him to design buildings that 'maximize the site.'"
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I was, of course, interested in Callaghan's use of "figuratively," for, as a poet, I was hoping that the fellow's clients were literally badgers. Ah, well. To each his own. On behalf of badgers, I was a little insulted that they were described as greasy and compared to developers. What did they do to deserve that?
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But the "found-poem" lay in the headline, so thanks to the headline-writer who worked on Callaghan's piece. I have arranged the headline as a poem, and I think the found-poem is nice way to finish off National Poetry Month in this wee badger-den of the blogosphere.
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Found Poem
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Building codes
Can't save us.
We're at the mercy
Of
Developers' moods.
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from The News Tribune (Tacoma), April 30, p. A-3, bottom.