Today at the Worldwide Headquarters of Manhattan Infidel™ I have the pleasure of interviewing the respected and influential poet William Carlos Williams.
MI: Good day to you, Mr. Williams.
WCW: Good day to you Manhattan Infidel.
MI: I must say I’m very excited to have you here. You are the first poet I’ve interviewed.
WCW: Why thank you. I’m humbled you chose me. No doubt you want me to talk about my award-winning work “Patterson” and the role of imagism in poetry. I’d be delighted to discuss these deep, intellectual topics and currents of thought.
MI: Actually I just want to talk about the Red Wheel Barrow.
[William Carlos Williams sighs]
WCW: It’s always the damn wheel barrow. Now I know how Led Zeppelin feels whenever someone asks about Stairway to Heaven.
MI: I’d like to quote in full your greatest poem.
WCW: My greatest?
MI: “So much depends upon/a red wheel barrow/glazed with rain water/beside the white chickens.” What exactly did you mean by so much depends?
WCW: Just stuff. You know. Lots of stuff. It all depends on that wheel barrow.
MI: Yes I know. But what stuff?
WCW: Stuff! So much depends on it! Stuff.
MI: Could you be more specific?
WCW: Stuff! Everything depends on the wheel barrow!
MI: Why?
WCW: Because!
MI: I’m not following you. Why does everything depend on the red wheel barrow? You also write that it’s a red wheel barrow beside white chickens. Does the red wheel barrow represent the native Americans and the white chickens represent Europeans encroaching on their land?
WCW: No!
MI: Could the red wheel barrow represent the Iron Curtain and communism? Are the white chickens America who will not go to war with the Russians?
WCW: What? No! The red wheel barrow represents stuff. Stuff! That’s all! Stuff!
[Pause]
MI: So you don’t know what it means either?
[Pause]
WCW: Not really. To be honest I was pretty drunk when I wrote it. I was trying to impress one of the nurses at the hospital I work at.
MI: You work at a hospital? Are you an orderly?
WCW: I’m the head pediatrician!
MI: You work with children?
WCW: Yes.
MI: Ever give them hormone blockers or help them along in their transition to another gender?
WCW: No!
MI: And you call yourself a doctor!
WCW: Oh my god! I just want to get back home to New Jersey.
MI: You’re from New Jersey? Do you know Bruce Springsteen or Jon Bon Jovi?
WCW: No I don’t. What magazine did you say you worked for?
MI: I don’t work for any magazines. I’m a blogger actually.
WCW: What? I’m talking to a f*cking blogger?
MI: Yes but my blog is very popular. Every week three of four people read it. One last question. Would you give a red wheel barrow puberty blockers and help it along in its transition to a new gender?
WCW: You’re insane.
MI: Only technically. Well that’s about all the time we have –
WCW: Thank god. I am out of here.
[William Carlos Williams leaves]
And so ended my interview with William Carlos Williams. Dammit I forgot to ask him if the red wheel barrow represented climate change.
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