Ka--Slam!!

Here's an article on the "poet" Billy Collins:

"Why Billy Collins Is America’s Most Popular Poet"


If you scroll through the comments, you'll find this one by "mentalship":

I have not read any of Collin's work but after reading this article it will be a long time before I do. One of the reasons I love poetry is the  subjective relativity when reading poetry. I want my reading to be a personal experience and watch the meaning and unfolding of the words to resemble the blossoming of a flower. I don't want to read poetry as graffiti in a pisssy smelling subway car. 

I don't need to hear about my mortality as if it were a subliminal message; I know about death as an 18 year old grunt in Vietnam during the 1968 Tet offensive. To me this is condescending and gives his humorous tomes a weak spine of fatal reality. I think this guys stuff could be termed as pop poetry and I'm not going to waste my time on the media drooling over the number of books he sells. 

I may be totally wrong about his tomes but he seems to be arrogantly content with his Poetry for Dummies. To mention him in the same sentence with Frost is so very wrong. I think I'll bypass this particular writing and stay with those who use their blood as ink.

Sometimes you don't need to read. Sometimes you just know. Sometimes stuff sends out an announcing wave or vibe ahead of itself, and it's obvious: "These poems will be banal." Amen, brother!