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03-21-2019 08:06 AM - edited 03-21-2019 08:09 AM
Born on March 21, 1905, Phyllis McGinley was a master of light verse, essays, children's works. She was a kind of poet of midcentury suburban observation.
Her daughter said that Phyllis and her father led a kind of benign "Mad Men" existence. Pulitzer winner, Time Magazine cover subject. Now rarely spoken of.
Here, she brings her sharp sensiblity to a dentist appointment, in "Intimations of Mortality":
"....But your apple of comfort is eaten by worms, and is sour".....
( Ha-- she's got that dentist's number.) If you read the poem below, I'd turn off the narration-- it's hideous, sounds like a robo-recital. You'll benefit more by reading the poem with the sound off!
03-21-2019 11:02 AM
Thanks for posting @Oznell
I had completely forgotten about her. This morning, I spent a little time reading about her and enjoying some of her poems.
One of the articles stated she described her work as “sonnets from the suburbs”.
“I love my daughters with a love unfailing,
I love them healthy and I love them ailing.
I love them as sheep are loved by the shepherd,
With a fiery love like a lion or a leopard.
I love them gentle or inclined to mayhem -
But I love them warmest after eight-thirty a.m”
03-21-2019 11:10 AM
@rrpell That one reminds me of Ogden Nash.
03-21-2019 09:57 PM
@ValuSkr It does!
oh my gosh, I just had the best time reading some of Ogden Nash’ poems... thank you for the reference. I find his verses are as funny now as when I first read him.
“To keep your marriage brimming
with love in the loving cup,
Whenever you’re wrong, admit it;
Whenever you’re right, shut up.”
— "A Word to Husbands"
“Children aren’t happy with nothing to ignore,
And that’s what parents were created for.”
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