Re: I Met A Girl / Will Dockery

On Wed, 5 Feb 2025 19:48:20 +0000, W.Dockery wrote:

HarryLime wrote:

Will Dockery wrote:

HarryLime wrote:

Will Dockery wrote:

>

I Met A Girl
>
I met a girl
she came from California.
It was in a dream
we knew each other instantly.
She was a little freckled girl
from out of
my high school past.
>
And she looked up at me
and talked real spacey.
I've forgotten her name
though she told it to me twice.
>
We talked
a really detached situation.
She said years ago
I was so shy
she thought I was gay.
At this point I kissed her
and put my finger to her hole.
>
And she looked up at me
and talked real spacey.
I have forgotten her name
though she told it to me twice.
>
I don't know why it was
that I would think of her.
I made a couple of puns
about her name that made me blush.
But her softness in tone
made me feel all right.
>
All I want to do
is get in contact.
>
-Will Dockery / May 8 1982

>

Good to see....

>

Thanks again, as I was telling Mummy Chunk, in 1982 when writing these
poems I
was highly influenced by 1950s Beat poets and 1980s punk rockers.
>
So please excuse the foul language.

>

We were just having some fun, kissing and making out, as the young
people used to call it.

>

That's not how it's depicted in your poem,

>
Yes it is, Pendleton, you simply choose to misrepresent the content.

>

Perhaps you should consider rewriting it so that your "make out" session
didn't take place 30 seconds after

>

You're mistaken, Pendragon, it didn't happen that quickly.

>

you bumped into this woman you barely
knew (and whose name you couldn't remember),

>
It was over forty years ago, so yes, I confess that I've forgotten her
name.

>
Your poem doesn't say that you'd forgotten over the 40 ensuing years,
Donkey.
>
It says that you didn't know her name at the time, and that even after
she'd told it to you -- twice -- you immediately forgot it.  This
implies that you didn't see her as a person, but entirely as an object
(a "hole").
>
You also derisively note that she sounded "spacey" -- revealing that her
personality was inconsequential to your desires.  You wanted a "hole,"
and she was there.
>

or in response to her
saying that when you were in high school together, she thought that you
were gay.

>
Well, obviously she could see this wasn't true.

>
I don't know about that, Donkey.  Back then you were skinny as a rail,
sporting a white boy afro, and perpetually wearing a pair of dark shades
(even indoors and at night).
>

That way the only offensive thing would be your

>
I apologize to all who were offended by the graffic depiction of our
somewhat tame romantic encounter.

>
Don't you realize that your "apology" is redirecting the blame on your
readers?  You're sorry if *they* chose to be offended by your "tame
romantic encounter."
>
Readers find it offensive because:
>
1) the girl appears to be either still in high school, or just out of
it,
2) you make it appear as if you barely knew her,
3) couldn't bother remembering her name after she'd told it to you,
4) kissed and groped her without her consent (to prove that you weren't
gay,
5) described your "romantic" in crude, impersonal, dehumanizing terms "I
put my finger to her hole."
>
Try apologizing for what you wrote (and apparently actually did in real
life), and not because you think your readers are easily offended.
>
>

misogynistic/objectifying reference to "her hole."
>
--

>
Yes, I did apologize to those who were offended by the foul language,
and have explained that the writing style was influenced by Best poetry
and punk rock.
>
And so it goes.

>
See above.  The language ("hole") is probably the least offensive part
of your poem

>
In your ignorant and conservative opinion, you mean.

>
Did you mean to say "ignorant,"

>
Yes, sorry, that was an autocorrect typo.
>
It happens to all of us sometimes.

Some of us more than others, n'est-ce pas?

My opinion is hardly conservative,

>
It seems to be, you seem like a rather uptight prude.

Not at all, Donkey.
I wasn't exactly living the life of a monk, either.
I just didn't engage in, or approve of, sexual assault.

post-"Me Too" era where sexual assault is finally being openly
recognized for what it is.

>
And what it was not in my poem.

It may have been nothing more than a make out session in real life, but
in your poem, it's depicted as a sexual assault.

Compared to the writings of Beat poets such as Allen Ginsberg and
Charles Bukowski and the punk rock lyrics of Sex Pistols and The Clash
my poetry is definitely pretty tame.

>
Good for you

>
Just stating the facts about what things were like in the New Wave and
punk rock scene in Atlanta Georgia, May 8th 1982 was like, Pendragon.

In 1982 I graduated from high school and joined the Navy.  I think it's
safe to say that I had I was familiar with similar scenes during that
particular era.

So you didn't hold a knife to her throat

>
Read the poem, we talked and kissed.
>
Look it up, men and women do these kind of things, Pendragon.

I've talked to, and kissed, women, Donkey.  I just didn't publicly grope
them in lieu of a handshake.

As I explained, on May 8th 1982 when the events of the poem took place,
I was a latter day Beat poet socializing in a punk rock scene in Atlanta
Georgia.

>
So what?  I hung out in the East Village with beatniks and punk
rockers...

>
Good for you.

Do you think that Atlanta ca. 1982 was any more wild than the Village
ca. 1988?

>

but I didn't walk up to girls, introduce myself, and grab
ahold of their crotch.

>
Read the poem again, I never did that, either.
>
Why do you lie and misrepresent so much, Michael Pendragon?

I've read the poem several times, Donkey.
Again, that may not be the way it happened, but that's definitely how
your poem depicts it.
As I've told you time and again -- if you're going to be a writer, you
need to learn how to write.
Learn already.

>

In fact, I behaved in a very tame manner compared to many of my peers
there at the nightclub that night.

>
So you were a reserved baboon

>
Okay, so I've joined you on the Planet of the Apes now, groovy.

You and I will always be from different planets, Donkey.
--