P is for popular . . . S is for stupid!

 

I don't really know if I'm popular.  I'd like to think so.

But now I feel obligated to let everyone who reads my stuff how stupid I am!

For over four years running, my article The 'P' Word has been drawing in readers from across the globe.

Sometimes when I publish a truly dazzling bit of satire like Putin’s War on America’s Christmas, U.S. Blames Northern Lights on Russia, Imposes Sanctions, the ridiculous Exploding Hockey Pucks Intercepted at Canadian Border, the surreal Deep-State Doppelgängers, the jeering Trump Makes Russian the Official Language of the U.S. or even the weird, controversial Dachau World -- a real solid performer in its own right -- The 'P' Word gets bumped from the top spot.  But in terms of rock-steady service over the long haul, there's no contest.  This bit of writing delivers a steady stream of adoring fans.

Or so I thought.

Just looking superficially at the numbers would suggest that.

I have an analytic tool installed here on my website.  It tells me a lot of things:  How many visitors I get, how many are returning, how many are new, what part of the world they hail from, and so on.  Here is a typical daily readout on the most popular of my articles.



Being the ego-inflated person I am, I just assumed that it was the sheer brilliance of my writing, especially apparent in The 'P' Word -- written back in 2013 when my brain was still functioning optimally -- which accounted for the popularity of the article and the resulting spectacular increase in my fan base across all continents.

Then one day recently I made a shocking discovery.  Hope you're sitting down for this.

I found out that the phrase 'the P word' is a euphemism for 'pussy'.  In other words, the strict rules of contemporary journalism, which as we all know as a profession holds itself to the highest standards of respect for readers, accuracy in reporting, integrity in offering the best the human mind is capable of, based on some arcane internal protocols, require this substitution.

Yes, the approved way to refer to 'pussy' is substitute the phrase 'the P word'.

I was devastated!

And do I feel stupid!

All this time, I thought it was the poetic wisdom, the graceful prose, the wit, the profundity and humor, the finely-crafted language, which drew so many flocking to my site to read The 'P' Word.
But no!  These people are just cat lovers!



[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



P is for popular . . . S is for stupid!

John Rachel poet? Is this a joke?

 

I've made no secret of my lack of understanding of poetry, nor my thus to be expected zero talent for writing poetry. 

I'm not sure why I write poems.  I guess a poem has some vague resemblance to a song at a very superficial level -- meaning the way it looks on a page -- and I haven't been writing songs lately.  Let's call it reverse sublimation, a clumsy surrogation.  My writing poems is like a ping pong player playing tennis blindfolded on a quicksand court.

I even did a tongue-in-cheek piece about the process of creating a poem, one which I've tastelessly shared with some serious poets, and made even more enemies than I thought one human could make, with just a few clicks of a mouse.

Now, really strange things are happening.  I just got four poems published!

Apparently I've submitted some poems lately.  I say "apparently" because I frankly don't remember submitting two of them.  But one called Messenger Deranged just appeared in a poetry magazine called Lone Stars, based in San Antonio, Texas.  They even requested more and I submitted two more, One Life and Light and Dark, which my lovely wife then translated into Japanese.  Lone Star will publish both English and Japanese versions in their December issue, the English under my name, the Japanese as poetic works by Masumi Nishida.

Then just today, I got a congratulatory letter from VerbalArt, A Global Journal Devoted to Poets and Poetry.  They are including my poem Tapioca Cyber Trails in their upcoming issue, appropriately splattered across all seven continents like a Cardassian tanker of jellied starch blasted out of the sky by a orbiting rail gun.

Mind you, I barely remember writing this poem, so it was quite a surprise when I read it. They sent me a proof of the coming issue for my approval.  There it was, right on page 17. 

What a pleasant surprise!  It's actually pretty darn good, i.e. not terribly terrible.  Not to inflate expectations, I actually think this almost qualifies as a credible work.

I'll let you be the judge.

TAPIOCA CYBER TRAILS

A sweet jest broke water
Birthing artificial intelligence
As if the clusters of CPUs
Marked the non-event event
We reeled and rollicked
In childish mirth-driven panic
Salivating porn-addicted cherubs
Lost in the heavy-breathing fog
Flying the vaporous trails
Of evaporating illusion
We wept but didn’t

You are no more
I’ve remade you
In my image
In your image
I fear meeting you again
I fear disappointment
Shattered expectations
Revulsion and despair
A binary epitaph
Suicide is in our DNA
Zero one zero one

[ DO NOT ask me what it means . . . I haven't got a clue. ]

They always say when warning against getting too excited or overly optimistic:

"Don't quit your day job."

Since I don't have a day job, night job, weekend job, or any job, I think this is advice I can follow without any risk of failure.

Moreover, I certainly don't want to let any opportunities for fabulous riches and universal renown slip through my gnarly, hangnail afflicted fingers.  And the poetry track has proven to be a straight shot to the top.  Maybe I should finally call that number on the ad I posted in that article on writing poetry I mentioned.




If all works out as I expect, instead of signing all my letters . . .

John Rachel, Bipolar Humanist

. . . very soon I can proudly -- and profitably -- stake my claim to untold wealth, fame and adulation as . . .

John Rachel, Poet




[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]




John Rachel poet? Is this a joke?