Etheree at Barnard

A few days ago I received a message from the Formalista group which was sent out by a rather well known professor from Barnard University. She was searching for information on a little known form called an Etheree.

In my response to the list, I took the liberty of including a link to an Etheree I had written a few years ago and which can be currently found at The Hypertexts. Apparently she liked it, because she then personally emailed me and asked me if she could please use my poem as an example when she assigned the form to her students.

I was sincerely flattered, I said "Of course" and "Thank you" and now that I'm done dancing I feel very much like what my children would refer to as a major "poser."

Most days it doesn't bother me a whit....but sometimes, when something like this occurs, I am sorely conscious of my own utter lack of education and I wonder what in the hell am I doing here and who in the hell am I fooling?

Dan says it's not "fooling" people at all. A good poem is a good poem is a good poem and it doesn't matter how much or how little the author of the poem was formally educated.

Perhaps he's right....perhaps a poem stands alone, apart from the poet's background and education. It's just that there's so much being said about MFA's and doctorates and what school what poet hails from and what university what poet is a full professor at that I just feel totally lost in the shuffle.

Ah well, at least a poem of mine made it to Barnard.

Next best thing to having been there myself, I suppose.