That Thing I Experienced Which Was Beautiful: A Guide to Writing Crapoetry

Poetry is the most expressive of art forms (according to poets), and is therefore the best (according to...me). Many guides have been written analyzing the subject, teaching you gullible lunatics who think writing has nothing to do with talent if only we can compartmentalize it enough how to write, how to think so you can write, how to observe so you can think so you can write, and so on into eternity.

But as far as I can tell, there are only a few guides on how to write mediocre poetry. It is a new genre I am developing called crapoetry, and it truly is the only form of writing that I know of which does not require even a tiny modicum of talent. William McGonagall, contending some say for the position of worst poet the world has ever seen, was a master of the crapoem. His piece, The Tay Bridge Disaster, might be one of the most inexpressive, pointless and trite poems of all time. Having studied the great crapoets such as McGonagall, Edgar Guest, and Margaret Cavendish (whose nonsense plagues us in college English courses still), I would like to propose three principles of the Crapoem in the Classical Sense.

1. Try to sound like a professional by using words and sentence fragments out of their original order and by talking in a sort of Victorian turn of phrase. Like Yoda, with a twist of Wordsworth.

Ex. The beautiful woman was being hit on by a bald clown at the circus.

The clown, balding from age and years of mirthless tomfoolery, was making his advances on a maiden fair at his place of witless comedy.

2. P't ap'strophes wh're they' d'n't bel'ng.

An excerpt from McGonagall's Attempted Assassination of the Queen:

And when they know of her coming,
Their hearts feel overjoy'd,
Because, in general, she finds work
For men that's unemploy'd.

3. Try to generalize; you wouldn't want your poem to be so specific as to actually mean something. Or, if it does have to be specific, write your poem about something that shouldn't matter or doesn't matter for the majority of people. For example, Tyler Graham's poem, My Dog Eats Anything begins:

I was reading a book

Then along came my dog
It was eating a taco
That it got from the mailbox
I started reading the newspaper
Then went out to the car

Perfect. Good balance of specificity and meaninglessness.

Combining all three principles, here is my submission to the realm of crapoetry, entitled

That Thing I Experienced Which Was Beautiful

How lovely in the m'rning air

That thing I saw was th'n and th're

It seemed so stately, proud, and true

A thing of b'uty thro' and thro'

I came along a wide road and long

To hear a sound like t' a song

And in that song I heard it sung

That in that thing th' b'uty hung

And swiftly borne on wind and wings

A million other b'utiful things

So b'utiful and fair and free

They brought me tears and tears to me.

Please, hold the book deals. I'm just doing this as a distraction from working on college coursework while it's summer. If you feel inspired by my crapoetry, I encourage you to write your own. In spraypaint. On a building. Or just write it in the comments section at the bottom of this page.

Apathy and ENNUI

Apathy is something a lot of well-meaning pastors, my fellow starry-eyed college students, and motivational speakers who are only in it for the quick buck and book deal talk about. These people are stupid, because all they ever talk about is passion and having passion and finding passion and they never find a new way to say what they are trying to convey, and so even in this way they are themselves apathetic.

Most of us are apathetic. Most of us like things the way they are to some extent, and those of us who don't are probably young or brave or both, and there is only so much room for people like that, because I take up a lot of space, and apathy breeds contentment, which in turn breeds contempt for change, which is generally a side effect of "passion." Apathy can be good because it keeps us from having to take steps back every ten minutes to make sure we're progressing in the right direction. If Thomas Jefferson was right, and we really should have a revolution every 20 years, we would spend all of our time killing each other, and nobody would ever get to enjoy the country we had revolutionized to. Besides, "passion" doesn't usually pay well. Just ask Peacecorps or Americorps volunteers. The Americorps website tells us, "Perhaps the biggest benefit you will experience when you join AmeriCorps is the satisfaction of incorporating service into your life and making a difference in your community and country." In other words, "passion" and "penury" tend to go hand-in-hand. Apathy isn't much of a living, but at least it's steady.

And of course I don't want to diminish what a lot of brave or stupid people have decided to do with their lives. The world needs a lot more of us suckers who can lead by example so the rest of them can stop feeling so dang content about their lives, but let's face it: most of us want to be Mother Theresa in a BMer. We want the glitter covered Hannah Montana's best of both worlds fantasy tripe where we simultaneously are normal people like me and you, but on the weekends everybody worships us, and of course by us I mean me. Everybody worships me. But I'm so humble that I don't even notice.

*pause while I throw up*

Anyways, I don't think apathy is even the problem because I know loads of incredibly hard-working individuals who struggle through the American dream every day at work, and get home in time for the sun to set on their white picket fence, and their children to ignore them for Ke$ha or their new huge LCD screen blaring out the latest gossip and nonsense straight from the evil heart of the West itself, Ryan Seacrest.

The problem is ennui. The problem is chronic boredom. It's a systematic dumbing down of the intellect on a consistent, though probably unconscious, basis. The problem is us finding new ways to keep ourselves occupied with the smallest, most distracting part of our already limited view so we can never see even what portion we might be able to see of the big picture. George of Dalmatia made a Baptistry in Sibenik where individual carved stone leaves resonate with specific musical tones when struck. This is inspiration. The Sistine Chapel was built in 4 years, and was Michelangelo's first major painting. His FIRST major painting. He was understaffed and underfunded, and he still turned out, in the time it will take me to get a useless degree, possibly the most beautiful piece of art the world has ever seen. This is the power of a man with a lot of direction and time on his hands.

Maybe instead of "stop being apathetic," we should be saying, "stop being so freaking dumb." Stop cutting yourself so much slack. Stop thinking about how much you need a break from work or a vacation or an opportunity to "recharge." Stop drinking so much coffee and 5-hour energy, and live your life as you know you should because this is your one and only chance to be everything you ever wanted to be, and to do the things the world never thought was possible, and if you don't take that chance, you will never find the meaning, the motivation, or the "passion" you crave.

Ghanarrhea World Cup Action

here is the truth about Tim Howard. he is such a good keeper that you actually have to suck if you want to score on him, because unless you are 1. Frickin Maradonna or 2. a really sucky player, you cannot score on the guy. he is great against great players. so if any player scores on Howard (Maradonna excluded) the player is insulting himself because good players cannot score on Howard. if, for example, a country like Ghana scores not once, but twice on Howard, this means that they suck twice as much.

a new blog

so here it is. yet again i find myself living the american dream, starting my own blog. i would start a website, but i'm too lazy to learn CSS or C++ or whatever language you geeks whisper sweet nothings into the ears of computers with. so this blog is going to be the medium for my creative genius. it's going to be full of a lot of things like random videos, my own hilarious short stories, snide comments about politics, and other things designed for you to get paid to laugh at because you're here instead of doing whatever you're supposed to do when you're at work. ;)