Perhaps the only reason for the blogosphere-at-large to be sad about Jenny's move to Pennsylvania is the fact that we will no longer be treated to the occasional missive from her "nabor," nor the poems that we turned them into.
Sigh. Those were the days...
Anyhow, in that spirit, I offer this link to Teresa Nielsen Hayden's page. Her mission? "...to come up with a poem so bad that the International Library of Poetry, to which I submitted it, neither declared it to be a semifinalist in one of their contests, nor offered to publish it in one of their pricey yet unreadable anthologies." And her solution? Taking a Miriam Abacha 419-scam letter and introducing line-breaks:
I salute you in the name of the most high God.
I was the former first lady Federal Republic of Nigeria, married to
late General Sani Abacha the late Nigerian military Head of State.
I am presently in distress and under house arrest while
my son Mohammed is undergoing trial in Oputa Panel Lagos
and Abuja, this Panel was set up by the present civilian regime.[and so on.]
You can read the entirety of "I am Mrs. Miriam Abacha a Widow" over at her site. Be sure to read the comments as well, which include all sorts of fun variations on this theme, like "I now salute you in the name of Ghod,/I who a piteous widow must complain./My son, my joy, arrested by a squad —/And in far Lagos he shall soon be slain."
Really. It's a hoot.
