NEWS: True Stories by Rob Corddry: Two Poems

CULTURE: True Stories by Rob Corddry: Two Poems

From the Editor:
Having been this year’s recipient of Yale University’s prestigious Bollingen Prize for poetry, it has been announced that two of Rob Corddry’s poems will appear in the latest edition of Norton’s Anthology. He will appear between Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Gregory Corso (alphabetically) on the condition that these poems appear, first, within the pages of his favorite publication, Suicidegirls.com.*


Time: Pictures from My Father’s Drawer
By Rob Corddry

Dad. I’m looking at a picture of you
When you were in Vietnam.
You were my age, younger.
I’m trying to reconcile
Your age with the age of your hands.
My hands are not as old as your hands were
When you were my age.

There’s another picture of you dad.
You’re not much more than eight
(though I’m not a good judge of age).
And your hands are marching hands
And your suit is perfectly tailored
And you have the look of someone
Who has been placed somewhere.

Here’s another picture.
Who combed your hair?
Who let you wear those shorts?
I can see right up your nose.
They look younger than you;
The boogers.

Ok, I can’t figure this picture out.
You’re acting like a
Jerk.
Rabbit ears behind your friend’s head.
You really thought we would believe that
Your friend had rabbit ears?
They look like fingers.

You have hair in all of these.
Not like now.
By the way, thanks for the genes.
Some kid called me “baldy”
The other day.
He was a teenager.
That was pretty fun.
Being teased by someone
Half your age.

Why can’t you keep porn
In your drawer
Like every other dad?
These pictures are boring.
Is that you coming home?
This would be awkward.

Here’s an entire album.
I’m just skimming through.
No.
No.
No. No. No.
There’s no good pics
Good enough for my poetry.
Wait, here’s one.
…Naaaaah.



And Ode to Alfred Lord Tennyson
By Rob Corddry

So clearly doth the body know too well,
How time doth pass

Dearly do the humors tone the knell
Of life’s repast

Like solid breath we eat the earth’s moss and leaf
So that every heart this winter day still beat
Full merrily:

Yet, I sharted.

The body still will tease;
The humors still will ease;
The food will still be et;
The hearts will beat on, yet,
I sharted.
I sharted.

My pants were nearly ruined.
O, vanity!
Beware, a poop waits at the door
As do the knocking masses.
See! The other Wendy’s patrons forsake
The amount of time it takes to make
My underwear presentable.

Scrub fast, scrub slow,
Time, mine enemy.
Brown now is the stitch;
That covered my loins.
Gone now is the twitch
That did rejoin
The air and my Frescata sandwich
O, misery!

Hark! The day manager is calling!
While I speak to ye,
The jaw is falling,
The red cheek paling,
The strong limbs failing
Air with warm poop mixing
The eyeballs fixing
Nine times does the hand dryer dry
My underwear now.

So let the people stare,
And let the bathroom door beat its frame.
And let the knowing whisper my name;
For even and morn
Ye must never scorn
Thro’ eternity
Such a perplexing moment
As when your nether lips have parted.
For I sharted.


*Men’s Health declined to run them, Suicidegirls.com being Rob’s second favorite publication.

UNFUCKING REAL. You my friend are the best.

Bravo, sir. Bravo.

Awesome.

I vigorously clap with one hand, well done, well done!

I am amazed and radicaled.

I sharted reading this. Sooo good!

Who published this guy? ha. I don't know whether to laugh or run away scared.

ahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahhhhhaaaahahhahahahahahahhahahahhahahahahhah... geez crise! This quite possibly, could be one of the funniest things I've ever read.

oh rob.. i wish to crack open your skull.. fuck your glistening trembling brains.. make sweet little membranous grey babies with thee and thine..

please..? i'll be gentle..

lover..

^^ ^^

It was , . . . ok.

Poems need alternate endings.
----

I'm looking at your hands now, dad.

I keep them in a jar

Next to my monitor.

They don't look so old anymore.

Am I good enough now, dad?