NOTE TO J. ALFRED PRUFROCK
I just dared to eat
a really big peach
as ripe as it could beand I have on
a pair of plaid shorts
and a blue tee shirt
with a hole in itand little rivers of juice
are now running down my chin and wrist
and dripping onto the pool deck.What is your problem, man?
*
Billy Collins was the U.S. Poet Laureate from 2001 to 2003.
—Beth Thackston Brooks is a retired teacher and beach bum who doesn't appreciate TSE.
WONDERFUL response by Collins!
From C. S. Lewis (regarding the opening three lines of Prufrock):
A Confession
. . .
For twenty years I’ve stared my level best
To see if evening–any evening–would suggest
A patient etherized upon a table;
In vain. I simply wasn’t able.
Bah. I love Prufrock. But I have to admit Collins is funny.
I remember when the Allman Brothers Eat A Peach album came out I wondered if it was also a note to J. Alfred. Would have been fitting. I don’t think it was though.
Glad to be challenged by Eliot and allowed to laugh at the dribbles down my chin, as well.
🙂
Light On Dark Water 
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