Guest flogging: Gee, I’m open-minded
Daily Herald reporter Caleb Warnock thought that my previous post was too hard on the newly-minted Utah poet laureate and submitted a rebuttal. Now, I don’t want any of our reporters to be carrying around painful baggage like this, so I figure the best thing is to let him vent. I can always follow up with some pithy comments later. Caleb asked his immediate editor if she thought I would be offended. She replied: “I don’t think that’s possible.” She obviously has no idea how many nights I cry myself to sleep.
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From Caleb:
With all due respect, Randy Wright should stick his pinky up his nose. And his Diet Coke too.
On Tuesday, the Daily Herald announced that one of Utah’s most beloved and hard-working poets, BYU’s Lance Larsen, has been named state poet laureate. Not only does Larsen write some of the best poetry in the West, he has spent years helping up-and-coming poets, teaching free poetry workshops, meeting with the state’s numerous poetry groups, and most importantly, helping the future generation of poets at BYU.
Mr. Larsen has spent his entire life earning the honor given to him by the governor this week. Once, that kind of achievement was greeted with acclaim, not derision and mockery. Mr. Wright — who has spent his life earning a living in the writing trade — knows something of the power of words, even if he has yet to discover a respect for poetry and poets. Mr. Larsen deserved better treatment.
Poetry does not fight for a place in the klieg lights of popular culture. The power of poetry is quiet. Poetry brings people to a higher level of understanding. Poetry encourages the reader to be still, to look into the soul. Poetry helps us understand events larger than ourselves — death, marriage, the meaning of life’s struggles.
Such interior observation makes some people uncomfortable, which is why poetry will never be as popular as, say, Diet Coke, or the latest blathering Hollywood bleach blond. Lance Larsen will never get a countywide standing ovation for his achievement. But his work has changed lives, and for that, he has earned the title of Utah’s poet laureate.
–Caleb Warnock