"To Psychoanalysis" by Kenneth Koch (poetry reading)

Har-tru is a kind of tennis court surface made of American clay.

Dr. Loewenstein has a Jewish name which is not uncommon for a psychoanalyst. Jewish names have the 'e' before the 'i', like Nietzsche doesn't. To remember that, think about Einstein or Old MacDonald.

In C.M. Korthbluth's novel "The Marching Morons" there's a description of a lady visiting her "family freud":
"He put on his traditional glasses and whiskers which were reassuring. She choked out the ritual, 'Freud, forgive me, for I have neuroses' and he responded with the antiphonal, 'Tut, my dear girl, what seems to be the trouble?'."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Marching_Morons

Actually, here's the whole thing, but in the original short story form. Later it was expanded to a novella.
http://www.wattpad.com/111513-The-Marching-Morons-C-M-Kornbluth

Richard Feynman called psychology "Cargo Cult Science". A cargo cult is the belief among primitive people that the manufactured goods of more advanced cultures are gifts from the gods. They believe that what they have to do to receive similar gifts is to imitate, to build artificial airstrips and artificial airplanes. It's easy to detect phony science by the fact that it has too much to say for itself and can't be readily understood. True science is succinct and simple, like e=mc^2.
http://www.lhup.edu/~DSIMANEK/cargocul.htm

There's a story about Feynman and Niels Bohr, (note 'i' before 'e', but Jewish nevertheless. It's not infallible.) which I'll relate because I've thought of it now. When entering Bohr's house, Feynman noticed a horseshoe over the door. He said, "Surely, you don't believe that horseshoe brings good luck, do you?" Bohr replied, "No, of course I don't, but I have been assured that it works whether I believe it or not."

Does anybody know the rest of the following poem, which I can't find on the web. It was written in about 1950 and appeared is an autobiographical novel called "The Dispossessed" - not to be confused with a later book of the same name about the same topic. It might be called "The Psychlotron" It begins:

"I have contacted Allah Freud
To ascertain de sacred woid,
Buttonholed de subway bunch
Dat daily wit de master lunch...."

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• Kenneth
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[videopossum]

@thallassocracy

Koch was (is?) an American poet. He was born in Cincinatti and seems to have spent his entire life in the US until his death in 2002. This recording, though a lovely reading, isn't Koch.

[rosasparx]

this is amazing~

[thallassocracy]

Koch is the only English poet I know - maybe apart from Skelton - who can actually do slapstick in poetry.

"Ruined cities were as nothing to me."

I had to stop the video and start again - I had lost my place through laughing.

I knew this poem before, but the way you read it even the Capital Letters are funny.

That is probably how It should Be.

[chalky5678]

I have heard this poem many times. But try as a might, i can never understand it. I come to a conclusion, only to be discontent with it, and force myself to delve further into the poem, but I never seem to be satisfied with what i discover.