the deadman poems
A long time ago, I attended a workshop Michael Delp taught about writing. I bought a copy of his chapbook the deadman poems. It quickly became one of my favorite books of poetry. Unfortunately, I shared it with many people in my life and eventually the book never came back to me. (If you have it, could you please send it back to me? It’s signed to me.) I’ve been searching for a replacement copy for years with no luck. A friend, who happened to have the same book in her possession, just loaned me her copy. I’m going to stay up late tonight reading it cover to cover.
For most of us in that workshop, Deadman was magical and became an inside joke. Many of us went on to write our own Deadman poems. I can’t bowl or sit in meetings without thinking about him. We would elbow each other and whisper “Deadman as a Woman,” “Deadman as Writer,” or “Deadman as President” at appropriate moments and laugh knowing outsiders wouldn’t understand.
Why am I blogging this, you ask? Because anyone who has ever done committee work or had to attend a meeting (and librarians are famous for committee work and meetings) can probably relate to these lines from “Meeting Deadman:”
“At each meeting, he says
we will have another meeting,
which in turn will have a meeting of its own.
We will meet constantly.
Our lives will become meetings.
We will write memos to each other
about the content of all meetings.
At the beginning of each meeting
we will chant the word meeting, until
we reach a consensus.
We will form a meeting committee,
with a subcommittee to discuss meetings.”
Sound familiar?
Gosh, I miss those days when that same group of students would gather on the library steps after dark to share poetry and art with each other. Is blogging my way of doing that now? What ever happened to those days? And where are those people now?
Addendum 3/12: You knew this was coming, didn’t you: Blogger Deadman, two poems I wrote inspired by Michael Delp’s work.
