“Plank Walk”

flourish17

The Found in the Public Domain special series continues with “Plank Walk” by Margo Taft Stever.

Margo gives the poem some context:

“‘Plank Walk’ is one of a number of found poems created from letters written by my great great grandfather, Peter Rawson Taft, when he was institutionalized in the Cincinnati Hospital for the Insane. These letters form the core of my latest chapbook, The Lunatic Ball, and my upcoming, full-length collection CRACKED PIANO. Peter had earned the distinction of graduating from Yale University with the highest grade point average of any student to that date, but then he contracted typhoid fever, from which he was never able to fully recover. Both of my latest poetry collections explore the nature of the chasm between the certifiably insane and the everyday madness of existence.”