Round 21

Yusef: "Landscape" by Louise Glück

Bob: "To a Student Who Reads 'The Second Coming' as Sexual Allegory" by Jeffrey Franklin

If there's anything I dislike more that a poem by Louise Glück it's a poem by a professor about his student's misreading of Yeats (or anyone else.) The title of Franklin's poem pretty much tells you all you need to know: the title/premise is likely to be better than the poem itself. (Like the poem about Beethoven's nine "Sympathies" in the other book). Glück's poem presents an eerie, ethereal landscape. She is talented, and this is one of the best I've seen by her in recent years. She wins the round for Yusef.

After 21

7-11-3