I recently viewed 3 readings of Billy Collins’s poem, “Litany” on You Tube. One was by Billy Collins (http://bit.ly/cfldS); one was a recitation by a three-year old (http://bit.ly/bkZIYm); the other was a by a guy who read and smoked a pipe at the same time (http://bit.ly/j7wNqZ). Not surprisingly, Billy Collins was smart and funny and wonderful. And for second place, it was between the 3-year old, who had memorized the poem, and the guy with the pipe.
Admittedly, the guy who read the verse and smoked a pipe at the same time was impressive, especially when his pipe went out and he non-chalantly loosened the tobacco, tamped it and lit it up again. All while reading! Did I mention he had a beard that made him look quite – quite! – erudite?
And admittedly, the three-year old didn’t appear very erudite. Occasionally, he looked around the room at his toys that seemed to beckon him, a distraction which subverted any erudition that he might otherwise have exuded and made it impossible for us to imagine him at dinner parties using words like “droll” and “Nietzschean.”
Nevertheless, despite this obvious handicap, the 3-year old was remarkable. Seriously, a few of his lines flowed with surprising ease, so naturally that I forgot he was reciting a poem. I heard the words as someone would speak them. His approach was appropriate, because if you’ve read Collins, you know that he can be a deceivingly complex poet who very often uses the colloquial and its rhythms. This child may have been flawed and lacking in polish, but he was impressive. The little guy deserved second place.
Our own work should be so effective. If engagement is to take the consumer unaware, our creativity must not smack of advertising or affectation. It should be “smart,” just without the quotation marks. Most of the time, I would venture, it should touch the part of us that we have in common with each other – it should touch the child within us all.
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