Round 52:

Yusef: "A Bad Imitation of W.H. Auden" by Robert Pinsky

Bob: "The Back of my Dead Husband's Head" by Sharon Olds

Pinsky's poem starts out like this:

We adore images, we like the spectacle
Of speed and size, the working of prodigious
Systems. So on television we watched

The terrible spectacle, repetitiously gazing
Until we were sick not only of the sight
Of our prodigious systems turned against us

But of the very systems of our watching.

It gets worse. There is a Donald Duck reference. He is trying to do a "public" poetry in a way that doesn't work. Let's hope Louise Glück doesn't try to write like this now she's laureate. The real title of the poem, by the way, is "Anniversary."

Olds' poem is actually entitled "Frontis Nulla Fides." It has its moments, but is too clunky even to win over the Pinsky poem. No points are awarded this round, not even to the "tie" category.

Score after 52:

Still 16-26-9