Milwaukee Zoo - 2011 ... and William Wordsworth

Sometimes I drive for work, which means that I often bounce between listening to the radio, listening to CDs/MP3s and listening to podcasts and lectures. I'm back on a Teaching Company lecture kick these days. I made it all the way through the Roman Emperors (Augustus through Constantine), bailed on the history of the crusades (the fall of Byzantium is, apparently, boring^*), bailed on a brief diversion back into audio books because David Foster Wallace is a pretentious asshole and have landed on English Romantic Poetry.

^* I may lack the historical context to understand the fall of Byzantium and need to listen to another lecture set between Rome and the Crusades.

I have, in the past, had a hard time with poetry. I found my "literature appreciation" classes in college to be far more about "guess what the teacher is thinking" than "discuss how this work could affect your life". Poetry classes were, by far, the worst. I had hoped that as I grew older, I'd start to 'get' it better. After all, in my late 20's, I developed an appreciation for Psychology and Economics. My early 30's helped me appreciate History and Sociology. I thought maybe I'd be ready for poetry.

Nope.

I appreciate the poets' lives. I appreciate their mastery of language. I appreciate their place within the evolving historical and social context... but their work... not so much. (Except for Keats. I still like Keats.)

So what does this mean? It means that I went to the Milwaukee Zoo in late 2011. Here's the set.

Here's one of my favorites:



( And here are birds misunderstanding William Wordsworth's 'Tintern Abbey' )