Thursday! on a Friday: An Ogre Reading for Certain Subscribers

“I Dreamed of Ogre” was one of the first, if not the very first, poem I posted on my website¹ back in March, 2021. It’s not, as poems go, very good. I wrote in free verse, like a lot of modern poets and, like a lot of modern poets, my effort wasn’t very poetic. It doesn’t flow as well as it ought — the musicality just wasn’t there.

That doesn’t mean I don’t like it, though. Just the opposite. I like “Ogre” quite a lot, which is why I included it in last week’s Thursday! and why I read it aloud for you here. Despite its lack of poetic merits, “I Dreamed of Ogre” carries very real feelings of wonder and wish. When I was younger, I dreamed a lot of what we grown-ups call silly dreams. I didn’t want to be an ogre exactly, but I desperately wanted to be more than I was — bigger, stronger, fierce and fearless, undeniable. If you listen closely, you might hear those yearnings from a voice that’s older but not entirely done with dreaming.