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Dubious Achievements in First LinesWhat a Swell Morning This Is!This is a morning to say something. This is a really keen morning —Edward Dorn But Stay In Tonight The gaunt thing with no organs creeps along the streets —Imamu Amiri Baraka Next Time, Try Ex-Lax Walking up sands, offal is gaped from a tunnel seaward, muddying its edge. Bowels ceaselessly open, add to the sea, not much. —Jon Silkin Er…Yes I saw God! Do you doubt it? Do you dare to doubt it? —James Stephens Strange Produce Dept. So through that unripe day you bore your head, And the day was plucked and tasted bitter. —Philip Larkin Sweet Tooths Anonymous The universality of things draws me toward the candy. —William Carlos Williams It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad world world world world —Samuel Beckett But Attention Must Be Paid a salesman is an it that stinks Excuse —e e cummings Strange Produce Dept. Redux The mango on the mango tree— I look at it, it looks at me. —Robert Penn Warren It’ll Make More Sense after a Couple of Glenlivets Knedneuch land And a loppert sea And a lift like a blue douped Mawkin-flee. —Hugh MacDiarmuid Well, Okay, If You Insist Admire the old man, admire him, admire him —Stevie Smith You Can’t Get Good Help These Days From the wash the laundress sends My collars home with ravelled ends. —A.E. Housman And You Your Emily Dickinson Dickie You were wearing your Edgar Allan Poe printed cotton blouse. —Kenneth Koch But My Poe Blouse Covers It Your Midriff sags toward your knees —Anne Sexton Some of My Best Friends, in Fact Despair is big with friends I love, Hydrogen and burning Jews. —William Meredith Know Thyself Dept. It occurred to Marshall that if he were a vegetable, he’d be a bean. —George Meredith They Never Mentioned it in the Guidebook O sleepy city of reeling wheelchairs where a mouse can commit suicide … —James Tate And Size Matters Too Position is where you put it … —Robert Creeley But It Only Worked With Parrot God tried to teach Crow how to talk. —Ted Hughes Unless It’s Irish Spring It’s not exciting to have a bar of soap —Ted Berrigan And On Monday Avoid Us in the Elevator Sunday the only day we don’t work: Mules farting around the meadow. —Gary Snyder But Apply for Hunting License Now Once in a hundred years the Lemmings come —John Masefield It’s Inevitable! Sometime during eternity some guy shows up —Lawrence Ferlenghetti Wait’ll You See Them Apples Your thighs are appletrees —William Carlos Williams Strange Behavior in Sky Dept. “Poor Wanderer,” said the leaden sky, “I fain would lighten thee…” —Thomas Hardy Stange Behavior in Wind Dept. The wind stood up, and gave a shout. —James Stephens That’s Gonna Hurt Tomorrow wade through black jade —Marianne Moore Nor Bark at Her, Nor Hump Her Leg Making his advances He does not look at her, nor sniff at her —D. H. Lawrence Uh, The Second Thing Did he strike soundings off Vecta Insula? Or was it already the gavelkind igland? —David Jones And Pure Addition Wasn’t Enough to Save Him The little cousin is dead, by foul subtraction —John Crowe Ransom Gloria Steinem’s Been Saying It For Years How beastly the bourgeois is especially the male of the species. —D. H. Lawrence Dr. Seuss Learned Here Mrs. Noah in the Ark wove a great nightgown out of the dark. —Robert Duncan You Get What You Pay For The galloping collections of boards are the house which I afforded —Robert Creeley All This Time I Thought It was Margie Downstairs, “Knocking Up” All night Chinamen jump on Asia with a thump. —Frank O’Hara If They Were Smart, They Would Have Gone to Med School Dentists continue to water their lawns even in the rain —Robert Bly If Norman Bates Had Married… I’ve done what I could. My boys run wild now. They seek their chances while their mother rots here. —Ian Hamilton And now, from the two-volume American Library anthology of Twentieth Century American Poetry, more glorious dubiousness! Dept. of Surreal Paranoia Rest me with Chinese colours, For I think the glass is evil. —Ezra Pound CatFancy.org Our orchestra is the cat’s nuts. —William Carlos Williams Dr. Seuss Learned Here I know you wonder why I wear The hat which I have called Green Hair. —Elinor Wylie Sort of Glad I Don’t Know Ya Dept. If bathing were a virtue, not a lust, I would be dirtiest… —Arthur Davison Ficke PrimateFancy.org Idonean lemur, sport with me. —Orrick Jones Call the Scrape Squad The dam Bellona littered her eyeless offspring Kriegsopfer upon the pavements of Vienna —Mina Loy Lilliputions Anonymous I should like to creep through the long brown grasses that are your lashes —Angelina Weld Grimké Dr. Seuss Also Learned Here Nobody noogers the shaff of a sloo. Nobody slimbers a wench with a winch —Carl Sandburg Dept. of Long Arms and Dubious Metaphors I have taken scales from off the cheeks of the moon. —Mardsen Hartley You Got Me There Do you been or did you never? Ha! —Ramon Guthrie Those Darn Unsolvable Conundrums How do I know why you ask me, “How are you? How are you? How are you? How are you? —John Wheelwright Glad I Wasn’t There Dept. Silence braided her fingers in my hair. —Hildegarde Flanner Really Glad I Wasn’t There Dept. Smelling or feeling of the several holes above the jawbone and below the belly… —Edwin Denby Aw, I Knew That Hell is a red barn on a hill. —Robert Francis Say Whut? Wind was not, flat was, but was imminent. —R. P. Blackmur I Will If You Will Against time and the damages of the brain, sharpen and calibrate. —James Agee Maybe I’ll Join You Dept. It’s so peaceful on the ceiling! —Elizabeth Bishop Here, from various sources, still more dubious first lines.. |
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