Below the Beltway

I can't tell you how pleased and proud I was to discover that one of my high school classmates has become a famous poet. I can't tell you because The Post frowns on bald-faced lies. The fact is, I wanted him vaporized, or at least rendered dyslexic in a tragic poetry-machine accident. Sorry.

It's not merely that Charles Bernstein is a full three times as hot as I am, as certified by the nationally recognized thermometer of fame, Google hits. And it's not merely that back in high school, Charles was the Rich, Handsome Kid Who Wore Jackets and Ties and Probably Scored a Lot, whereas I was the Nerd With the Bad Hair and Thick Black Glasses Who Definitely Didn't.

It's mostly this: When I went out and bought some of Charles's highly acclaimed poetry (he's written 20 books), I realized to my horror that . . . I couldn't understand it! Charles is a founder and exemplar of Language Poetry, a controversial literary movement so willfully opaque that even some experts can't quite explain it. Here's an actual opening line from a Charles Bernstein poem:

gOP thItS biG GOBBie bucket, seLls lik reiNdeEr haRwAre bUj thAz's na thwat poont, flin ferg juS brEaGinG ab gez laSto flubper. (It's titled, of course, "egg under my feet.")

When I learned recently that Charles would be at Georgetown University to read his poetry, I invited him to lunch. Because I was intimidated, I brought along a copy of our senior yearbook, which seemed reassuringly equalizing. It reminded Charles that he had lost his copy--possibly, he said, when he sold his personal papers to the University of California.

Me: Please share for my readers your most intimate memories of me and our time together in high school.

Charles: They are so intimate I cannot share them. Actually, they are so intimate I have repressed them. One of the reasons I went into poetry was to forget things. Maybe I have gone too far. It may be irreversible.

Me: You don't remember me at all, do you?

Charles: Not really.

Me: Being a highly literate and sophisticated person, I understand your poems perfectly, of course. But for the sake of my readers, some of whom do not share our sophistication and may actually be stupid, could you explain this one? You'd do it so much better than I.

I place my arm on the armoire.

The minister frowns.