Kooser in Repose

Let’s congratulate Ted Kooser. Some American poets do their thing — simply enough — by writing poems. Others take it a bit further: they teach poetry to our verse-starved countrymen. And still others, people like Kooser, go above and beyond and incorporate poetry into our lives on a weekly basis.

Kooser had a folksy, mid-West American upbringing. His father worked in a department store. Later, Kooser earned money and supported his family by working as an insurance salesman, all while taking night classes and earning his MFA.

He attended college in Iowa, where he was deeply influenced by William Carlos Williams, and then went on to study at the University of Nebraska, where one of his professors was the very fine Karl Shapiro. Despite such gravitas, Kooser spent much of his career working in the insurance business. Initially, his poems did not elicit high praise or recognition. But they did reflect a strong regionalism anchored in the small, rural farm towns of the Great Plains.

(more…)

No march of whales,
no different June.
Only this June.
A broken woman.
A smoking owl.
Something certain
dies.

Many eyes.
They are jealous of my sorrow.
At least it has a name.

Local fame.
Pink bells.
Rubberized hands.
Puzzling tubes, all very clean.

A sleeping machine.
A confabulation.
Do not ask my advice
on coping.

Snakes and ropes.
Chinese omens.
A noose swinging
above my head.

Every bed
belongs to the sick.
My stomach is a waif.
My heart is a rag doll
in a cage.

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Lauren Carpenter lives and works in central Ohio. Her poetry recently appeared in The Greensboro Review.

Ready To Show Where His Heart Is

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