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The NW Inlander
Making A Scene
by Sheri Boggs
There's no denying the fact that many of the images in Scott Poole's
poetry are quietly hilarious. In one, it's a slice of lunchmeat
suddenly giving rise to thoughts of Andy Warhol. In another, a
man comforts himself post-vasectomy "holding a bag of frozen peas
in one hand and a bottle of painkillers in the other." And in
yet another, a narrator contemplates all sorts of grisly medieval
revenge upon the car that has suddenly stranded him outside The
Dalles. But to call his poetry "funny" seems a rather risky proposition.
Not because the poet is in any way dangerous, but because "funny"
is such a limiting word for describing what it is that Poole does.
"There's not a lot of humorous poetry out there. There's been
a bit of a renaissance in the last couple of years — for instance
Billy Collins, the poet laureate, writes humorous poetry. But
up until now, most light verse has been simply light. It's not
deeply felt material," he says. "I write how I think, which tends
toward the humorous, but at the same time, I've always had this
darker, more serious side."
In his new book Hiding from Salesmen (from which he reads
on Tuesday night at Auntie's) and in his debut collection The
Cheap Seats, Poole has shown a keen ability for conjuring
up what feel like miniature short stories, using seemingly disparate
elements and a healthy appreciation for the absurd. Take the poem
"Why I Love My Garage Door Opener," in which the speaker
decides to grow corn in his garage as "a cure for dumbness." The
speaker is suddenly musing on whales and how they might dream
of corn, and playing with his garage door opener the way he imagines
a whale might blink its enormous eyes. It's a leap, but in Poole's
hands it becomes much more than just fiddling around with illogicalities.
In fact, this poem and the others that comprise Hiding from
Salesmen exhibit a subtle intelligence. While whoever's speaking
might be willing to play the "fool" card over and over again,
there is a sense of overriding wisdom in that the things that
are truly important — love, family, friendships, work — are a
constant no matter what craziness ensues.
Poole's verse is so well wrought, and his ability to combine the
embarrassing and the sublime is so well-developed, it's hard to
believe his introduction to poetry was almost accidental. As a
psych major at WSU, he happened to take a writing elective from
Carlos Sanchez.
"He was kind of the grandfather of Chicano poetry in the U.S.,"
says Poole. "He was by far the most inspiring teacher I've ever
had."
Poole switched majors and stayed on another year at WSU. He got
his Master of Fine Arts degree from Eastern and took over the
helm of EWU Press when its long-standing director James McAuley
retired in 1998. That same year, Poole and his colleague Christine
Holbert launched the first Get Lit!
festival, where Poole read a few of his poems
and ended up getting a publisher on the spot.
"All these people, some of them editors and publishers, were coming
up afterwards and saying all these great things, and then Christine
marches up and goes, 'I want to publish your book.' "
Holbert's Lost Horse Press published The Cheap Seats, and
Poole went on about his work of making Spokane a safe place for
poetry to live. Get Lit! will celebrate its fifth year this spring
and is already on the brink of gaining national recognition. In
addition to his continuing work with the EWU Press, Poole has
a weekly poetry newsletter and records his poems for broadcast
on KPBX every Monday morning during Morning Edition.
"I thought they'd put me on in the middle of the BBC broadcasts,
like between 1:01 and 1:02 in the morning," says Poole. "But they've
got me on during drive time, which is pretty cool."
Pretty cool, indeed. It's safe to say that his poems are heard
by thousands of people every Monday, and he routinely hears from
people who remember not only specific images from his work, but
sometimes even entire passages. But even though his verbal inventions
are sometimes breathtaking, in fact, even though he can take a
simple Monopoly game and turn it into a sweetly affecting love
poem, he remains a study in self-deprecation.
"I've always felt that there are two kinds of poetry. There's
the big, beautiful kind with important ideas and Shakespearean
language," he jokes. "And then there's the kind that I'm good
at." |
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