What the Chairman Told Tom

From "Why Live Without Writing" in the latest issue of Poetry

 Basil Bunting, angry English member of the circle of the equally angry Ezra Pound, offers a portrait of the skeptic in his poem-monologue, “What the Chairman Told Tom”:

Poetry? It’s a hobby.

I run model trains.

Mr Shaw there breeds pigeons.

It’s not work. You dont sweat.

Nobody pays for it.

You could advertise soap.

Art, that’s opera; or repertory—

The Desert Song.

Nancy was in the chorus.

But to ask for twelve pounds a week—

married, aren’t you?—

you’ve got a nerve.

How could I look a bus conductor

in the face

if I paid you twelve pounds?

Who says it’s poetry, anyhow?

My ten year old 

can do it and rhyme.

I get three thousand and expenses,

a car, vouchers,

but I’m an accountant.

They do what I tell them,

my company.

What do you do?

Nasty little words, nasty long words,

it’s unhealthy.

I want to wash when I meet a poet.

They’re Reds, addicts,

all delinquents.

What you write is rot.

Mr Hines says so, and he’s a schoolteacher,

he ought to know.

Go and find work.