Knott Politics

I don't believe in censorship, but censure is sometimes called for. In this case, it's a piece of pseudo-political dreck by Michael Robbins, who—in a poem tantalizingly entitled "To the Drone Vaguely Realizing Eastward"—attempts to avenge the 200-plus children so far killed by drone strikes. Here's the first verse:

This is a poem for President Drone.
It was written by a camel.
Can I borrow your phone?
This is for President Mark Hamill.

Maybe one has to be drunk on Sterno to write this way, or maybe all it takes is a PhD from the University of Chicago. In any case, readers who enjoy bashing their own skulls with a tire iron may enjoy the rest of Robbins' ersatz poem here.

If, on the other hand, you prefer (a) real poetry and (b) real politics, let me suggest a real poet: Bill Knott—the fellow I believe Robbins is ham-handedly trying to imitate (in tone if not in form). Take, for example:

Testament

You know the fable
How a soldier’s bible
Kept in his jacket pocket
Stopped a bullet

But that catechism
Born to foster schism
Also stopped his heart his
Mind from finding peace

He would not have had need
Of such a shield
Nor would his blood have been
Thrilled to kill someone

Of another faith
If in that book he had not first read death

Or Knott's poem about Robert S. McNamara:

Secretary

The technocrat gloats
at his remote desk
but just to show
he's still human

he still does a few
chores by hand
and adds a human
touch for example

rather than having
his computers do it
he himself stamps

all by himself
stamps PAID on
the casualty-lists.

And, inimitably (take that, Ez!):

Penny Wise

well alright
I grant you
he was a fascist
ahem antisemitism the
er war and all
I'm not defending them
but at least
you've got to admit
at least he
made the quatrains run on time

These I got from Knott's Selected Political Poems, 1965-2005, which is (I believe) out of print. More's the pity!