Wednesday Poetry Prompts: 491
Every Wednesday, Robert Lee Brewer shares a prompt and an example poem to get things started on the Poetic Asides blog. This week, write an anecdote poem.
For today’s prompt, write an anecdote poem. An anecdote is a short, often interesting, story about a real incident or person. Like I might write a poem about something someone said or did at the post office when I went to buy stamps, or maybe something amusing happened at the grocery store.
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Here’s my attempt at an Anecdote Poem:
“I Once Nearly Killed Bill”
Of course, this all happened
before the Kill Bill movies,
but my friends and I were piled
into the old minivan together,
and I was driving as usual
and feeling a bit distracted
by all the chatter as we looked
for a good parking spot outside
the Columbus comic convention
when it happened: someone
shouted, "stop," and I slammed
the brakes to just barely not hit
Mr. Kung Fu David Carradine,
who slowly raised his eyes
to meet mine and gave me
a death stare unlike any
I've ever received and without
a word walked onward
to whatever he had to do that day
Of course, not long after, he was
in all the Kill Bill movies,
and I thought about the irony
that I'd nearly killed (or
at least badly injured) Bill
before they could be made,
and it was something I'd think
from time to time, and I was
glad he was alive and that
I had a spotless driving record,
and that was all good
until he actually did die,
and they thought it was
suicide at first, but then realized
it was accidental asphyxiation
related to self-bondage,
and then, I've since wondered
which death "the barefoot legend"
would've preferred:
being found hung in a hotel closet
while trying to perform
autoerotic asphyxiation on himself
or getting hit in a parking lot
in Columbus, Ohio, by a minivan
full of distracted fanboys.
