Wroth Redux, with chickens--

Cockerel courtesy of sxc.hu
and Philip MacKenzie of London

Approximately one year ago I (the mild-mannered, the peaceable, the tactful) committed a fulmination, a fume, and a fuss entitled Wroth, Wroth with Ted Hughes. It had to do with chickens and old ladies and lovelessness. You may want to rush over and read it all over again (because naturally you have read it once, being all up on matters of chickens and old ladies--and you want love. Don't we all!)

Anyway that little fuse of a post kept burning until it ignited a little bonfire. Jeremiah Douglas has written a very interesting response called "An Unfortunately Collected Poem by Ted Hughes." Whereas I dashed off an impetuous and perhaps feather-brained response, he has connected my little fluster to issues of ethics, good and evil, and good and bad poetry. And in doing so, he has said some very interesting things, and not just about Ted Hughes and chickens.