Ahhhhhhhh . . . . . . . poetry.  It’s a little like rounding the dark corner of an alley in a beautiful big city and suddenly smelling old dusty bums in shabby clothes who failed to make it to the urinal in time.  A disappointment to be sure.  We want football and beer and tailgates with reality TV.  Instead, a poem suggests bean curd shaped like a hotdog.  Nothing to do with what is real.

Or is it everything to do with what is real?

“The old house went down the basement stairs                                                                       And didn’t come back up.”

Did you see it?  Come on.  Plastered across Iowa are foundations of old farm houses with only a basement stairwell remaining filled with junk.  Did the words twist around your brain in a way that evoked an image?  That awakened another time?  That made you feel?

“The swamp has become a supermarket overnight.                                                              A heron with no business sense                                                                                   Vanishes.”

As you chew on the words, slowly, carefully, did you smile?  Or did you feel something else?

“Old women bend their heads                                                                                              To earth                                                                                                                             While they zigzag                                                                                                                  An inch or so                                                                                                                      Above their grief.”

Oh my.  At halftime, over the chips and beer, read Tom Hennen’s book of poetry: “Darkness Sticks to Everything,” Copper Canyon Press, May 4, 2013.  And please pass that bean curd that is shaped like little smokies.