An excerpt from a poem by David Berman and my subsequent attempt to justify unlawfully reprinting copyrighted material.

The New Idea

From a third floor window I spray a sad look
down into the courtyard of the office park
filled with cold pebbles and benches

There are little donuts for sale in the breakroom
vending machine called gems or donnettes

or, gemettes, I can't remember,
and I'd rather not retrace the string of decisions

that have left me stupefied before
an inspirational poster that claims
"The First Word in Can't is Can."


Due to it's dense history of uncomfortable moments,
our elevator is haunted with poorly conceived smiles
and sinking hearts, so I take the stairs

to the boardroom and pass a mailroom clerk
with reggae leaking out his walkman

and a crumpled secretary who,
as the office rumor goes,

keeps a thurmos on her desk filled
with the ashes of her dead bulldog.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is a good place to stop.

Why this was an ok thing to do...or not-

Well, for one, this poem concerns an office worker. Large numbers of people who make and read blogs are folks who work in offices--we can relate. One major reason that it was wrong to post this chunk of David Berman's poem on my blog is that it's only a couple of years old. I would really have no problem putting up something by T.S. Elliot or some other dead guy/gal. No, this bit is from a poetry book that is out right now called Actual Air.

I can honestly say though that typing this poem out reminded me a lot of drawing the Guns-N-Roses logo on my bookbag in seventh grade. Guns-N-Roses was something I was awed by and I felt proud to have a visceral appreciation for.

So, shame on me for treating someone's serious work like a bit of youtube video but...whatever. I think it looks cool.