The Best Words

On March 15th I ran an event called "Girl Talk." (See earlier post on this.) One of the members of the audience was Isabel Augusto Queijo, unbeknownst to me, a fellow blogger. Isabel picked up a copy of my book, What Feeds Us, and later asked if she could feature one of the poems at her blog. She chose "The Best Words" and posted it yesterday along with some nice links, a cover image, and this very clever photo which she based on the first two lines of the poem: "The ones that sound obscene but aren't, / that put a finger to the flame but don't burn."


Check out this slightly naughty poem at Isabel's blog, A Room of One's Own.

This was a fun poem to write. I keep an idea journal on my kitchen table. At the back of this little notebook, I collect cool words. I have a fondness for words which sound obscene but have perfectly polite meanings. These are words you can say without getting into serious trouble. After I had a goodly number of such words, I wrote the poem. It was one of those poems that took a long time to write and involved multiple drafts and lots and lots of revisions. But it's one of my favorites to read at readings. I'm always happily surprised by the laughter it evokes, often from people I might have expected to somewhat disapprove.

Also check out Isabel's blog. She has some amazing photography posted there.