Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

what a fucking town!
chock-full of yahoos and ding-dongs
each with a story to tell
where do they find these stories
what possesses - no!
what compels them to tell
these incongruous tales to begin with
i used to listen to them
i was an idiot and didn't know better
i theorized and speculated - stuff like:
what manner of beast is this, or
how far back does this peculiar strain of idiocy go
much like a sociologist, i became a participant observer
and wallowed among the flotsam and jetsam -
the bastard sons and daughters of godless humanity
seeking rustic wisdom and something good to catch a buzz on
but, after thirty years or so i got tired of the whole mess
now they just piss me off with their carny bullshit
their hokey gee-gaws and goofy old ladies
they can all go fuck themselves
if you want to know the truth

One hell of a powerful punchy angry poem & why not.

That last line is irony----if this were a painting that last line would be painted in red.

The verbal pyrotechnics of this poem work well.

Taking this poem as an expression of an attitude this works brilliantly. The poem does or could intimidate a reader. You wouldn't want to meet this speaker in a social setting. There is enormous anger in this.

(I don't take this as a confessional poem but as an expression of an adopted attitude which is expressed well.)

it is confessional - i've always been a sociopath, but people seem to like me anyway so i'm cool with that.

Perhaps surprisingly, given the importance of conformity as a theoretical construct in social psychology and the profound implications of anarchy and listening to idiots has in relation to not conforming to social norms ... it pays to be genuine and insincere at the same time !

life is lonely for the sociopath.
unless he is a poet.

funny, this doesn't seem all that angry to me. kind of a medium-energy dino poem. sociopath, ha, right. he did plunge himself into the midst of jerry springer families of mother-rapers and father-stabbers and father-rapers, etc., (well, dope-world, you kind of can't help it) and at the beginning was interested in that sociological kind of way - he told me stories about it - but 30 years on had gotten tired of it. i can see him doing his dismissive 'eh enough, go away' hand gesture at the end.

sweetwater, i'm surprised he didn't reply to your reply,

sweetwater wrote:genuine and insincere at the same time !

- was just his kind of thing.

i feel a little funny saying all that. i'm not trying to take possession of dino here or say i'm the big dino expert, i just lived with him a long time.

Rereading this poem after a period of time and Dino's death I read it differently. I brought things to the poem which may have colored my view. There was a conflict with some of the local poetry "authorities" which I rightly or wrongly read into the poem. But poems can be read so many ways.
Taking a common phrase we all use "what did you say?" It can be read many ways, many inflections, tones of voice, emphasis on different words. I read Dino's poem as an angry gesture against the literary establishment. You put it I a different context and I see the validity of that. The poem has a life of its own. It can accommodate a number of contextual interpretations.
It is still interesting to read. Will probably always be interesting to read because it is genuine----"genuine and insincere" at the same time. I too like sweetwater's comment.

yeah what was that poem where he really lets em have it?......sometime i'll try and find it....

I have been reading Dino's, (blessed be his memory), book
I was hoping this poem is in the book but have not found it yet.

I was reading it through the windshield of a semi truck in the high seat looking down at all those maniacs in cars and feeling like Lew Welch in his Chicago Ad Agency days.

love that title g-d knows I am one

sweetwater wrote:

it pays to be genuine and insincere at the same time !