Some Anxieties Influenced by Harold Bloom

We begin to suspect Bloom is nuts
and not altogether fit to print, but
we’ve been bitten by his bug,
been buggered by it, that’s basic,
that’s last quarter’s Lit Crit.
Shakespeare he loves, fine, as in
No Peers, as in no way.
Loves a bit less (but still loves)
Ashbery the Untethered: ‘‘John’s
the modern uninfluenced diva, John
makes non-referential dives’’—
into the Bloom River aka
the East and/or Hudson River(s)
since no writer is an island west of that,
no Wild West copycats for Bloom—
‘‘No, nope, not,’’ he me-ows,
not that we think he has nine lives,
not that we think he knows everything,
though he might know everything
and land on his feet, as we might not.

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