That gaze…

Last night in the infamous Havemeyer 309, Columbia’s Philolexian Society held its equally infamous 31st Annual Alfred Joyce Kilmer Memorial Bad Poetry Contest. If for some sad reason you could not attend the event, Bwog Staffer Tamara Barriot will try her best to recapture the essence of every brilliantly bad poem that competed for the honor of the “Best of the Worst.”

As tradition calls, the event started with the biography of Alfred Kilmer (CC 1908 and Philolexian Society VP), detailing the complete story of how he, his wife, and a friend decided to submit various terrible poems to literary magazines. All poems, of course, were submitted under a pseudonym; however bad the poems were, they soon became very popular and received a lot of attention—so much, in fact, that Kilmer and Co. had to kill the “author”. Nonetheless, the bad poems remained, the most notable being Trees which, as the name suggests, is a beautifully horrid poem about trees and poems.

In honor of Kilmer’s legacy the Philolexian Society holds the Bad Poetry Contest every fall. And this year, as many before, the night began with last year’s contest winner, a poem titled The Lost Cherry, Or, You Never Bring Me Flowers, Or, Beneath the Apple Blossom Tree You Have Awakened Me, Or, You Guys This Is the Smuttiest Thing I’ve Ever Written but the Bible Is Way Smuttier” (yes, the poem was as long as its title), after which 25 poems competed to be honorably selected as the very best of the worst.

1. Dream a Wet Dream About Me: a multimedia poem (it involved music and lyric singing) inspired by the song Dream a Little Dream of Me, but dealing with the specificity of a wet dream.
2. I am the Voice That Sells You Chocolate: a compilation of all the innocent yet sensual and good things the speaker is. Notable lines: “I am German, but not Nazi German, more like clean the dust in your plants German.”
3. Choose Your Own Sonnet: a sonnet that required audience participation to determine the course of events, which ended up being about a pet centipede, a manual, and Putin’s plan to control sweets.
4. The Road Not Taken For Obvious Reasons:* a parody of Frost’s poem with (almost) the same title about taking the road less traveled on – for security concerns due to Google Maps not loading correctly. A notable line: “I took the one less traveled by / because I figured a dude might jump out and kill me on the other one” (3rd runner-up).
5. My Past Google Searches For Last Week: a compilation of the poet’s Google searches, which included: “how to lose 13 pounds in 13 days” and “what are the Shakespearean sonnet rules/ how to find a man who’s not a tool.”
6. Concession: A First Draft by Hillary Clinton: a somewhat sad but hilarious speech poem by “Hillary Clinton” in light of her concession, right after losing Pennsylvania. Notable lines include “America, when will you use your real names on Twitter”, “America, the cherry blossoms have fallen,” and “Wisconsin, I trusted you.”
7. Bite Me: a graphical description of the speaker being eaten by cute and adorable puppies. Notable lines include “I want to know how it feels like to have a puppy eat me whole” and “… when your little tails are wagging to and fro full with my brain matter.”
8. Delusive Fuckboy: a series of qualities, including “flexing”, that make a fuckboy a fuckboy. A notable line: “I live by the 3B’s: Bros, Booze, Babes.”
9. Untitled: a descriptive narrative of a boy’s masturbation with a crucifix, since his mother took all his pornography. Notable lines: ”It’s not gay if it’s with Jesus, it’s just Christianity.”
10. 2 AM McDonald’s Run: an epic poem in 4 acts, and a reflexion on human life and God’s abandonment of people. The poet starves in a McDonald’s parking lot because they’re not opened 24/7, as promised. Notable lines:  “It was closed / the Golden Arches were closed” and “God slept as I starved alone in the McDonald’s parking lot.”
11. Love Poem to Conspiracy Theorist Alex Jones: alliterative poem about an attack of a man. Notable lines: “… And liberal protests hosted by / the Jews?”
12. A Man Explained Something to Me*: a woman’s realization of her ignorance as a man explains something to her: feminism. (Winner)
13. Missing in Action: a Sweetgreen Story: a poem dedicated to Colin, the poet’s boss at Sweetgreen, and how he disappeared one day. Notable lines: “GPA is not a great indicator of how good a salad maker one can be” and “What’s your commitment to salad?”
14. Early Morning Musings*: PrezBo’s morning musings about his legacy, or lack thereof. Notable lines: “I suppose I can still lay claim to Manhattanville” and “… The imperial expansion of Bollinger’s Manhattan mansion…” (1st runner-up).
15. Wait We Still Drunk: a drunk musing; the poet speaking a little like a drunk man himself. Notable lines: “… Now weeping whiskey drunk…” and “… Set it all to orange / nothing rhymes with orange.”
16. Warts Have Feelings Too*: the absorbing relationship between an STD and the person who contracted it, all told through the eyes of the STD, who feels underappreciated. Notable lines: “Who knows you better than warts in your body” and “They say love is a drug / I think it’s a disease.” (Dishonorable Mention: the filthiest poem).
17. Hail to the Chief: plagiarized from Melania Trump’s speech.
18. The Fear of Being Bad: a poem inspired by the author’s drunken stumblings through Spain and waking up hungover on the beach. Notable lines: “Bad poems are us.”
19. Beez: the poet forewarned the audience, “Bear with me, this poem is a bit philosophical,” and then delivered a beautiful one word poem: “Beez”.
20. Acrostic Poem Joyce Kilmer Memorial Bad Poetry Contest: a journey of a person being abducted by aliens. Notable lines: “Over many nights we became familiar”.
21. Your Face: a detailed description of why the poet loves his partner’s face that repeats the word face with several meanings. Notable lines: “When your face faces my face…” and “I prefer to face you face with my face.”
22. Untitled by William Butler Yeats: a very detailed poem, much in the rhyming style of Yeats, about going and finding someone somewhere.
23. Siren Song: a poem dedicated to an unnamed person who sang terribly in the car while the poor poet had to listen and assure the singer that his voice was not bad. Notable lines: “… Your voice transporting me to another world / that world is hell.”
24. Untitled: a detailed description of how the speaker felt throughout the day because her armpits smelled too bad. A notable line: “Never in my life had I so badly needed deodorant.”
25. My Poem*: a musing on how the poem is or is not a poem based on its attributions, rhyming scheme, and subject matter. Notable lines: “This poem is about a poem” and “Poems have meter / this poem uses feet” (2nd runner-up).

Only the very worst poems can be insightful and funny in way that makes them good and almost very good poems. Last night, all Philo members (including new ones, a.k.a. all of us who attended the contest) enjoyed an evening of insight and beauty as deplorable phrases and verses floated on the air of Havemeyer 309. Surely all of us are now better individuals who are much more aware of our delicate coexistence with the world around us, thanks to Kilmer’s Bad Poetry Contest.

Six clones with accusatory looks via The Philolexian Society