Releases First Book of Original Poems, “Leaves of Grass”
Helena, Mont. (SatireWire.com) – Stung by allegations of plagiarism, charges he called little more than “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,” famed historian and best-selling author Stephen Ambrose surprised the literary world today by releasing his first book of poetry, a bracing, highly original collection entitled “Leaves of Grass.”
Early reviews have been exultant, heralding Ambrose’s ability to create verse that is at once unique and yet, somehow, instantly memorable, as in the book’s first poem, “The Fall of the House of Usher”:
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan,
A stately pleasure dome decree,
I think that I shall never see,
A poem as lovely as a tree
Unlike his biographies, which depend heavily on research and other historians’ works, Ambrose insisted “Leaves of Grass” was pure stream-of-consciousness, a claim that makes the heart-wrenching “Parting at Morning” all the more monumental:
Blackbird singing in the dead of night,
Take these broken wings and learn to fly,
You know you make me want to Shout!
Clap your hands now, Shout!
There is no joy in Mudville,
Might Casey has struck out.
“I thought writing histories and biographies was all I could do, but with poetry I think I’ve finally found my center,” said Ambrose, aimlessly tapping a worn copy of Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations sitting in his lap. “From here on out, I’m taking my own advice: ‘To thine own self be true.'”
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