Letters to the Editor

Poo rules!
BY BRENNAN CONAWAY
(12/13/99)

Perhaps you should have mentioned that in Japanese the words for snot, ear wax and eye schmutz (what do you call the stuff that accumulates in the corners of your eyes in English?) are hanakuso, mimikuso and meguso -- literally, "nose poop," "ear poop" and "eye poop."

I must say that the Japanese have a much healthier, more open view of normal bodily functions than we in the West do. The famous children's book writer, Taro Gomi, has been very successful producing such titles as "Everyone Poops.'' Making such topics taboo can only lead to dangerous ignorance and loathing of our own bodies and their functions.

-- Stuart Luppescu

Why is it magazines and newspapers and periodicals like this focus on the most bizarre and uninteresting stories in Japan? While I may have not lived in Tokyo as long as the writer of this story, I can think of infinitely more interesting stories. Yet this is all I find when I look around me in Western reporting. Why?

-- Brent E. Millis

Take-home test
BY DAVID CORN
(12/14/99)

The newfound emphasis on intellect in the political debate is refreshing, and I especially like the pop-quiz line of questioning that George W. has been getting. But in the interest of focusing on the modern, real-world responsibilities of the president, I have some other questions that should be asked: What controlling legal authority should be implemented to cover the shake-down of Buddhist nuns? Does committing multiple felony perjury and being held in contempt of court while covering up a squalid affair qualify a president as one of our greatest? Is a secret meeting of 500 or so insiders and political operatives the ideal way to nationalize health care, which represents one-seventh of the economy?

-- Adam Odak

We have lowered the bar for the qualifications required for the presidency with Bush, just as all bars have been lowered for him throughout his life: Poor prep school grades got him into Yale; poor undergraduate performance (C average) got him into Harvard business school; poor performance in business school got him investors for an oil company; poor performance in the oil industry got him into ownership of a professional baseball team. His parents would be proud to see their son achieve again despite his obvious shortcomings, but we should be afraid for the world. Proud parents tend to see the best in their kids. Voters should see beyond the Bush's delusions.

-- Suzanne Henry

The sad thing here is that Bush claims that he was reading about Acheson in an attempt to better understand implementing foreign policy. What he should have been reading is "Present at the Creation," Acheson's memoirs of his time in the State Department.

-- Patrick Flanders

Word doctor
BY RAFAEL CAMPO, M.D.
(12/08/99)

I am one of the few poets-only in the National Association for Poetry Therapy (i.e., I am not a therapist) and spend much of my time trying to convince practitioners and patients alike the value of revision. Healing always includes change, whether it is attitude, perception, behavior or treatment and prescription -- and often a combination. Revising our language toward clarification of the condition and options can lead us to a whole new set of realities.

Even if a so-called positive mental attitude written into a poem does not change the cancer, it certainly can change the attitude through the experience, and sometimes attitude has eradicated the condition. I appreciate Campo's careful explanation of his experience and hope that it brings thousands more to the threshold of what can work for them as well. We all have a poet inside who can lead us to realize our own great powers of observation, clarification, self-actualization and healing.

-- Jennifer Bosveld
Director, Pudding House Writers Resource Center
Author, "Topics for Getting in Touch: A Poetry Therapy Sourcebook"

• View blog reactions