the poem that started it all for me

when i was in high school, i was not a writer. i was shy, very tall, very skinny and very unpopular. things were compounded when we moved in the midst of my senior year. things turned out well, obviously (especially considering this is where i met my future wife) but it was not an easy go of it to be sure.
anyway, the teacher i was assigned to for English class--one Mrs. Anusavice--was a great teacher. she had this voice that was at once motherly and strong. her diction was clear and her enunciation was immaculate. she was also a lover of poetry, both classic and contemporary. we read a great deal of poetry--from Shakespeare to Byron to Yeats to Strand. and most of it was good.
the best, though, was the day she read the following poem by William J. Harris:

HEY FELLA WOULD YOU MIND HOLDING THIS PIANO A MOMENT

As you are walking
down the street
this guy asks you
to hold his violin.
It’s a Stradivarius.
Soon as it falls
into your hands you start playing like crazy.
The violin
almost plays itself.
Your powerful hands
nearly break the instrument
but the music is gentle and sweet.
You sweep your long artistic hair
out of your face.
Everybody
in the room,
in the bull ring, in the
audience, in the coliseum
starts clapping and shouting “Encore & Wow.”
Everybody whoever thought
that you were
dumb & untalented
goes apeshit
over your hidden genius.
“Gee, I never knew you
played,” says your astonished high school
principal.

William J. Harris

From Hey Fella Would You Mind Holding This Piano A Moment © 1974, William J. Harris

i love this poem. i loved it then, and love it even more now. the absurdity of it all. the flow. everything.
back then, i got a kick out of Mrs. Anusavice saying the word "apeshit" (and, i admit, still giggle a little when i hear now). but now, i love the fact that it is so simple and so irrationally absurd.

well, that poem did it for me. it opened my eyes to what poetry could really be. it showed me that poetry wasn't all meter and rhyme; that it was considerably more than iambic pentameter or villanelles or sonnets; that it could be funny and absurd and plain-spoken. this hit me hard and definitely inspired me to try my hand at laying down the line.

needless to say, i'm glad Mrs. Anusavice read this poem to our class back in '90. i'm glad Mr. Harris wrote back in '74. for without either, i doubt i ever would've found poetry.

i'm sure, though, that there are plenty out there who are silently cursing both Mrs. Anusavice and Mr. Harris for their parts in aiding that discovery.