This is from the discussion forum on RedPaper. You will have to register to read the context, but it seemed such a good demonstration of the value of the arts to all of us, not jus the critics and others who make a living from it, that I asked the writer for his permission to post it here.
I can recite many poems by various poets off the top of my head. I have sonnet 18 by Shakespeare crammed away somewhere between my ears. I used to work in a bikini store down in the Keys (I loved that job). The manager was moving away and was training me for the position. she used to have to bring her 3 year old daughter, Savannah, in with her sometimes as she couldn't afford a baby sitter and her husband worked long hours out on the fishing boats. One day we had little business and I was entertaining the little girl while her mother did the books. I decided to start reciting Shakespeare to her...."Hey Savannah.."
"yes?"
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"
::giggle:: "yes."
"Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. "I was in awe that this three year old had actually sat wide eyed and listened to me recite the whole poem. I was expecting to maybe get through three lines.
when I was done she ran over to her mother, threw her hands in the air like she was making a big circle and said "Mommy mommy, sometimes the sun comes out... and ... and... its big and pretty."I recited some of my poetry to Savannah too, three lines in she was back to drawing on the back of the counter with a crayon.
Kurt Erhard Berger