Issa's Untidy Hut: I Love the Internet: Small Press Friday

Friday, May 31, 2013

I Love the Internet: Small Press Friday

Photo by Tjflex2

The small press comes in many different varieties. I like to think of certain websites as small electronic presses and in the forefront I'd place "Moving Poems."

In this edition, the poet Kevin Barrington is bringing it with a humor as sly and wry as his knowing little smile. Of course, this originally appeared on the not-so-small-press Rachel Maddow blog (still, Moving Poems is drilling down to those of us crouching in corners, across the room from the keyboard, without cable, scratching the backs off mirrors - so it's new to you), so many of you might have seen it already. But on the off chance you didn't, here you go, with text to follow for the Gaeliclly challenged.

I Love The Internet - Kevin Barrington

Opium to DeQuincy
Sin to Milton
Congo to Conrad
Aran to Synge

I love the internet

Castles to Shakespeare
Deceit to LeCarre
Dublin to Joyce
Marketplace to Chaucer

Did we say
‘Daffodils to Wordsworth?’
We couldn’t forget that.
Or mounted jihad to Tennyson
Or the weird wild wonder
of the whole g** damn show
to Dylan

I love the internet

Wild, lewd, bawdy, bullying, smelling of cats.
Cranks, crank, meth, conspiracy, snipers, knoll.
Fascists made cartoon on ripe digital soil.
Erudite waltzing with trite.
In eternal ballroom
Dedicated skiers on seas of trivial loon.
Self help soma screaming thinnin tv hair repair.
And always the smiles of the filippino brides
And promises of untold nigerian riches.
Flashing wheel spinning ace poker squared
You Have Been Chosen
But
Shhhhhhh
Somewhere down there in the fly fishing section
the first faint whispers
(If ears are right)
of hushed talk
of
bold revolution.

I love the internet
The sheer
dull
scintillating
infantile
anarchy
of
it
all.

Boisterous Brughel medieval market.
Futuristic Middle Ages
Directed
by
Friar Tuck.
And offset, whispers
of
Robin
lurking
in
wood.

I love the internet.
Cos it’s ours.