The Lamentational Poets
Laments are among the oldest of poetic forms—stretching back to the Homeric Greeks and their sorrowful poems for fallen lovers and heroes. But modern poets, particularly celebrities, have taken this poetic form much further, lamenting the more poignant tragedies of modern life.
Flavor Flav
b. 1959
In this spare yet haunting verse, rapper Flavor Flav addresses a moment of regretful epiphany.
A Rapper’s Ruminations on Running a Restaurant (Chicken)
Let me be straight up with you,
I went up inside there on April 2 and I found potato salad that expired on February 28.
And it’s then when I realized I can’t do business with this man
And I really hope no one ate those potatoes.
Heather Mills
b. 1968
Heather Mills, perhaps best known as the former wife of Paul McCartney, lets slip the dogs of poesy and unleashes her angst upon being hounded by a neighbor in this heart-tugging lament.
Doggerel: On Being Blamed for the Death of the Next-Door Neighbor’s Beloved Dog Which Really Wasn’t My Fault
I’ve had 18 months of absolute abuse
and they tried to ruin my daughter’s birthday party
which I spent ages organizing,
saying I killed the dog next door. . . .
Complete rubbish.
I ended up being in contact with the lady.
She’d said, to get something out of The Sun
that the dog had had a heart-attack.
I chased back to the vet Tim and he said, “What a load of rubbish!”
The dog had been ill for a while
and dies of abdominal catastrophe on Sunday night . . .
That woman that did the story on the dog, if she’s so upset, why is she standing there posing for The Sun
the day her dog died?
What I just want to do is clear up a few things.
Joe Biden
b. 1942
With the following, Vice President Joe Biden moves us away from a lament to an elegy . . . of mistaken identity.
Your Dad, God Bless Her
His mom lived in Long Island
for ten years or so.
God rest her soul.
And—although, she’s—wait
—your mom’s still—your mom’s still alive.
Your dad passed.
God bless her soul.
Jim Cramer
b. 1955
The poet–financial pundit Jim Cramer here hearkens back to the incomparable lament of Dido in Virgil’s Aeneid. He replaces the classic dactylic hexameter with his own innovative Cramerian Sporadic Kvetchameter.
Rueful Ruminations After Being Made to Look Like an Asshole on a Top TV Show, or Once I Was Somebody, Now I’m a Buffoon
As soon as he started, I realized
Stewart was on a mission to make me look like a clown.
I didn’t defend myself because I wasn’t prepared.
What was I supposed to do,
Talk about how often I had been right?
Praise myself?
Get mad?
I was mad, but I didn’t want to give the audience any blood.
The national media said I got crushed,
which I did,
and made me into
a buffoon.
Jim Cramer
The versatile Mr. Cramer here moves away from the structured form and experiments with free verse in this follow-up lament.
More Rueful Ruminations, Etc., Etc., or Once I Was Cool, Now I’m Still a Buffoon
They wanted to make me the Face of the Era,
and they succeeded.
Rick Santelli’s a conservative. Ideological.
O.K., I get that.
But me? I was very
anti-Bush.
I’m a
DEMOCRAT
I’ve got the canceled checks to prove it,
and suddenly I’m the ENEMY?
Me? Me?
“Casino Jack” Abramoff
b. 1958
Neo-Beat poet (and former lobbyist convicted for conspiracy) Jack Abramoff turns an acid tongue on his former friend Newt Gingrich (who was, in effect, Kerouac to his Ginsberg) in this lament ripped from the heart. Written in the form of a blues riff, this is best read aloud over the sound of a wailing saxophone.
A Convicted Felon Riffs on the Fickleness of Friendships While Flipping Through a File of Old Photographs
Here’s Newt. Newt. Newt.
Reagan.
More Newt.
Newt with Grover this time,
and with Lapin.
But Newt never met me.
Ollie North.
Newt.
Can’t be Newt . . . he never met me.
Oh, Newt!
What’s he doing there?
Must be a Newt look-alike.
I have more pictures of him than I have of my wife.
Newt again! It’s sick!
I thought he never met me!
James Franco
b. 1978
A simple poem from a complicated man (actor, director, writer, student), “Two Tercets” addresses the very real regrets connected with seasonal dressing.
Two Tercets on Two Garments
I don’t wear shorts a lot;
I have really pale legs.
I wish I could wear shorts.
I don’t look too great in tank tops,
I just look weird.
I wish I could sport those a bit more.
Alan Simpson
b. 1931
The rather commonplace topic of this lament—changing times and mores—is superseded by the critical question that arises: To wit, did former Sen. Alan Simpson deliberately misname Snoop Dogg and Eminem as a satirical device or are the misnomers the result of a sensibility “not on the cutting edge”? Scholars have come down on both sides of this issue, leaving us, the readers, to make up our own minds.
Modern Times: A Lament
I think, you know,
Grandchildren now don’t write a thank you for the Christmas presents.
They are walking on their pants with their cap on backward
Listening to the Enema Man and
Snoopy, Snoopy Poop Dog.
And they don’t like ’em.
Jennifer Lopez
b. 1969
There are prices to pay for great art, as singer/actress Jennifer Lopez here explains. Notice the poetic effect of the harrowing last line of this poem, which leaves the reader stunned and virtually in tears.
The Price
You know, there are days when you just don’t feel like it.
And actors aren’t like, let’s say the crew on a movie.
They can’t just blend into the background and go,
“I’m not feeling well today.”
So we’re held to a different standard.
We work for it!
And we have better clothes,
and nice shoes, too.
Those are the perks, okay?
For our loss of privacy.
And for your mom calling you up crying, “You didn’t tell me you were pregnant.”
In the Style of . . . Shakespeare
Rahm Emanuel
b. 1959
Politician Rahm Emanuel’s sonnet is Shakespeare by way of David Mamet—a formal sonnet phrased in extremely vigorous modern vernacular.
A Shakespeare Behind the Beltway Sonnet
Shut the fuck up and listen to me for one second, Rod.
And I want you to listen carefully, because this is the last time I’m ever going to talk to you.
You are fucking dead to me. You been fucking dead to Barack since ’06, now you’re dead to me.
Know what that means?
That means you’re dead to my people in Chicago, Daley on down,
and all these friends you think you have aren’t gonna touch you with a ten-foot fucking pole.
Listen up asshole. The shit’s gonna hit the fan,
maybe tomorrow, maybe next month,
and when Fitz finally brings down the hammer
It’s gonna be my name that’s going through your head.
You won’t know the hows or the fucking whys,
but it’s gonna have my fucking fingerprints all over it.
Have a great life,
fatso.