We Real Cool

I love this ballad by Gwendolyn Brooks. It has a sad, sweet recklessness that grips me ever so often. I'm usually a sensible and measured sort right up until I'm not. There are days when I want to drive off the cliff that is the balance between emotion and intellect, just to see the crash.

I found this poem in a book called 'The Making of a Poem' -- a Norton anthology of poetic forms. It's a wonderful book for any aspiring poet because it explains the importance of form and illustrates with examples. For those of you who care, a ballad is apparently a short narrative usually arranged in four-line stanzas with a distinctive and memorable meter.

We Real Cool

(THE POOL PLAYERS.  SEVEN AT THE GOLDEN SHOVEL.)

We real cool.

 We Left school. 

We Lurk late. 

We Strike straight. 

We Sing sin. 

We Thin gin. 

We Jazz June. 

We Die soon.