Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1909-03-23
SOME BOSTON TIPS FOR
AMBITIOUS SPRING POETS

The season Is now at hand when wise
young poets take prancing Pegasus
out of his stall, loosen his stir joints
with liniment and take preparatory
canters up and down Main street. A
few words of advice may not be out OF
place.
First, hear the story Of New York
spring poetess and cling to Pegasus no
matter how he prance. Do not attempt
to ride taxicab instead
This New York lady tore off few
reams of verse and set out In a taxi
cab to gladden. the hearts of publish
Z ers with her literary confessions that
The world somehow don't seem the same
Since velvet-footed spring has came.
and SO forth. She visited publisher
after publisher, but each turned to her
the cold shoulder of scorn. They
laughed at her feet. her rhythm, her
rhyme. They gave her metre the
merry ha, ha, and pointed out that 1t
had blind staggers.
In the meantime the metre of the
taxicab gurgled merrily on, turning
out poetry Ito the soul Of the chauf-
feur) and pretty bum doggerel Tin the
opinion of the LADY,. The last pub
laugh and hope died in the lady's
breast. She stopped the cab. Merrily
then the taxi sang in Its gargling
metre. -Four dollars, please"
Now we will have a little tremulous
music, professor, for the sad portion
of our spring song is at hand. The
spring poetess had, alas, not sou.
And so the police court got her, and
today She sits lorn and lone where the
bursting buds and the song of the
robin penetrate not to the souls very
depths.
Wherefore spring poets will do we'll
to ride on Pegasus when they go forth
,aadA1tnor nd q
monkey with metres they know not of.
A rising young poet of Maiden
writes in to know II spring poetry
should be written on one side of the
paper only, and, If SO, on which side.
1t is customary to restrict verse of this
kind to one side, Percival, as this
leaves the other blank for figuring up
the grocery bill and SO prevents nice
white paper from being wasted. Per-
sonally, we like to see spring poetry
written always on the other side of the
paper--that is. the side which is not
opposite the face of the reader.
Rupert ]. Jiggs of SauguS asks for a
translation of the following, which he
has taken from spring poem of the
vintage of 1898:
Soft as a gentle maiden's touch,
The wind is on the lee
And I long with unutterable longing,
For my ships that are far at sea-
This choice bit has been translated
in various ways, but to our mind never
correctly. Several years ago the Des
Moines Leader conducted a contest,
Offering a prize to the man who offered
the most ingenious explanation, not
barring the author of the lines. The
author entered the contest, but the
prize went to a bakers apprentice
ITO my mind" wrote the winner of
the prize-thus confessing frankly at
the beginning that he had mind and
so did not belong in the ranks of the
spring poets himself--"to my mind the
poet is bemoaning a gentle maiden's
touch. Those who have been touched
by maidens, gentle or otherwise, sym
pathize with him at the very start. We
think 1t rather unfortunate that he
does not see fit to tell us who the
maiden was--his wife. his sweetheart.
his daughter or who. But we presume
he had good and sufficient reasons for
keeping silent on that point.
"The poet has been touched, and GER
tain of his garnered dollars have flown
away. The reference to the ships is
purely figure of speech. BY the ships
he means the dollars for which he has
been touched He longs for them with
unutterable longing. There are times
when all of us experience this sensa-
ton, but we cannot express 1t so beau
tifully as has this gentleman"
We feel, Mr.. Jiggs, that this is as
good an explanation of this very OBJ
scure passage as you will ever get.
Finally, we would remind poets who
feel inspired by this weather to write
ballads resembling "Ostlsr joe and
"The Face on the Bar-room Floor
that Mrs. Brown Potter has left the
stage, and it may be centuries before
another woman with the fine native
courage to recite this type of literature
can be found.--Boston Traveller