Very Bad Poetry

Very Bad Poetry
Author: Kathryn Petras
Publisher: Vintage
Total Pages: 145
Release: 1997-03-25
Genre: Humor
ISBN: 0679776222

Writing very bad poetry requires talent. It helps to have a wooden ear for words, a penchant for sinking into a mire of sentimentality, and an enviable confidence that allows one to write despite absolutely appalling incompetence. The 131 poems collected in this first-of-its-kind anthology are so glaringly awful that they embody a kind of genius. From Fred Emerson Brooks' "The Stuttering Lover" to Matthew Green's "The Spleen" to Georgia Bailey Parrington's misguided "An Elegy to a Dissected Puppy", they mangle meter, run rampant over rhyme, and bludgeon us into insensibility with their grandiosity, anticlimax, and malapropism. Guaranteed to move even the most stoic reader to tears (of laughter), Very Bad Poetry is sure to become a favorite of the poetically inclined (and disinclined).

Seriously Funny

Seriously Funny
Author: Barbara Hamby
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
Total Pages: 446
Release: 2010
Genre: Poetry
ISBN: 0820330876

Can serious poetry be funny? Chaucer and Shakespeare would say yes, and so do the authors of these 187 poems that address timeless concerns but that also include comic elements. Beginning with the Beats and the New York School and continuing with both marquee-name poets and newcomers, Seriously Funny ranges from poems that are capsized by their own tomfoolery to those that glow with quiet wit to ones in which a laugh erupts in the midst of terrible darkness. Most of the selections were made in the editors' battered compact car, otherwise known as the Seriously Funny Mobile Unit. During the two years in which Barbara Hamby and David Kirby made their choices, they'd set out with a couple of boxes of books in the back seat, and whoever wasn't driving read to the other. When they found that a poem made both of them think but laugh as well, they earmarked it. Readers will find a true generosity in these poems, an eagerness to share ideas and emotions and also to entertain. The singer Ali Farka Tour said that honey is never good when it's only in one mouth, and the editors of Seriously Funny hope its readers find much to share with others.

God I Feel Modern Tonight

God I Feel Modern Tonight
Author: Catherine Cohen
Publisher: Knopf
Total Pages: 80
Release: 2021-02-02
Genre: Poetry
ISBN: 059331834X

Poems of heartbreak and sex, self-care and self-critique, urban adventures and love on the road from the millennial quarantine queen and comedy sensation. in L.A. we got naked and swam in the ocean we ate cured meats and carrots & sat in the back of a red pickup truck like we were in a film where two old friends fight & wrestle their way into a hug heave-sobbing as the dust settles I want to be famous for being the first person who never feels bad again In these short, captivating lyrics, Catherine Cohen, the one-woman stand-up chanteuse who electrified the downtown NYC comedy scene in her white go-go boots, and who has been posting poignant, unfiltered poems on social media since before Instagram was a thing, details her life on the prowl with her beaded bag; she ponders guys who call you "dude" after sex, true love during the pandemic, and English-major dreams. "I wish I were smart instead of on my phone," Cat Cohen confides; "heartbreak, / when it comes, and it will come / is always new." A Dorothy Parker for our time, a Starbucks philosophe with no primary-care doctor, she’s a welcome new breed of everywoman--a larger-than-life best friend, who will say all the outrageous things we think but never say out loud ourselves.

Among Our Books

Among Our Books
Author: Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Publisher:
Total Pages: 758
Release: 1920
Genre: Libraries
ISBN:

Arrow

Arrow
Author: Sumita Chakraborty
Publisher: Carcanet Press Ltd
Total Pages: 95
Release: 2020-09-24
Genre: Poetry
ISBN: 1800170599

Winner of the Seamus Heaney First Collection Poetry Prize 2021 Shortlisted for the Michael Murphy Memorial Poetry Prize 2021 Arrow is a debut volume extraordinary in ambition, range and achievement. At its centre is 'Dear, beloved', a more-than-elegy for her younger sister who died suddenly: in the two years she took to write the poem, much else came into play: 'it was my hope to write the mood of elegy rather than an elegy proper,' following the example of the great elegists including Milton, to whose Paradise Lost she listened during the period of composition, also hearing the strains of Brigit Pegeen Kelly's Song, of Alice Oswald and Marie Howe. The poem becomes a kind of kingdom, 'one that is at once evil, or blighted, and beautiful, not to mention everything in between'. As well as elegy, Chakraborty composes invocations, verse essays, and the strange extended miracle of the title poem, in which ancient and modern history, memory and the lived moment, are held in a directed balance. It celebrates the natural forces of the world and the rapt experience of balance, form and - love. She declares a marked admiration for poems that 'will write into being a world that already in some way exists'. This is what her poems achieve.

Trumpty Dumpty Wanted a Crown

Trumpty Dumpty Wanted a Crown
Author: John Lithgow
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Total Pages: 113
Release: 2020-09-29
Genre: Humor
ISBN: 1797209485

Following the success of his New York Times bestseller Dumpty, award-winning actor, author, and illustrator John Lithgow presents a brand-new collection of satirical poems chronicling the despotic age of Donald Trump. Trumpty Dumpty Wanted a Crown is darker and more hard-hitting than ever. Lithgow writes and draws with wit and fury as he takes readers through another year of the shocking events involving Trump and his administration. His uproarious poems and illustrations encompass Trump's impeachment, the COVID-19 pandemic, the Black Lives Matter protests, and much more. Lithgow targets Mitch McConnell, Mike Pompeo, Bill Barr, Jared Kushner, Elaine Chao, and many others, but also includes a few heroes of the moment, including Anthony Fauci, Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, and even Barack Obama. The book arrives at a time when it's needed most. With all-new poems and never-before-seen line drawings, Lithgow will once again make readers laugh and pause to remember some of the most defining moments in recent history—skewering the reign of King Dumpty one stanza at a time. Digital audio edition read by the author.

How to Weep in Public

How to Weep in Public
Author: Jacqueline Novak
Publisher: Crown
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2016-03-01
Genre: Humor
ISBN: 0804139709

In her darkly funny memoir and guide to the depressed life, comedian Jacqueline Novak doesn’t offer help overcoming depression—just much-needed comfort, company, and tips for life inside the fog. “Jacqueline Novak’s unapologetic and original comedy is the kind that gives me hope in this business.”—Amy Schumer With advice that ranges from practical (Chapter 17: Do Your Crying on a Cat) to philosophical (Chapter 21: Make Peace With Sunshine), this laugh-out-loud memoir traces the depression thread from Novak's average suburban childhood to her current adult New York City existence, an imperfect but healthy-ish life in which Novak is mostly upright but still rarely does laundry. At heart, How to Weep in Public provides a no-pressure, safe-zone for the reader to curl up inside. Keep this book on the shelf to be returned to it as needed–after all, depression is recurring. Jacqueline will be waiting to you tell you “You can fight another day.” No, not as in “fight on another day” but “fight this some other day.” Whether you’re coping with the occasional down day, or thriving fully in Picasso’s blue period, How to Weep in Public is the perfect place to regroup during a dark stint. So sit back, relax, and let Jacqueline Novak show you how to navigate the shadowy corridors of your troubled mind or the cheese display at the supermarket when food is the only thing that can save you.