Friday, April 25, 2003

Joseph Duemer has posted the text of the "SUV poem" that got Stephanie so steamed when she read an article about it in the Oregonian. While I appreciate Duemer's attempt to actually subject the poem to a (at least semi-)serious analysis, I honestly think the most important touchstone here isn't Marianne Moore or even spirituals but our great American poet laureate, Dr. Seuss:

Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You’re off to Great Places!
You’re off and away!

You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself
any direction you choose.

You’re on your own. And you know what you know.
And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go.

And the SUV poem's author, Patrick O'Leary, not only exists but has a website, on which we learn that he actually has an entire collection of poems, as well as a new science fiction novel "ABOUT ALIEN INVASION, RESURRECTION AND BROTHERLY LOVE."

That science fiction thing makes me wonder if the poem is really more allusive than it might appear. The poem's climactic sentiment--

And wherever you're going
that's wherever you are

--bears an uncanny resemblance to the adage "Wherever you go, there you are," widely attributed to Buckaroo Banzai.

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