Benedick

Patrick and I got Kenneth Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing from Netflix and watched it three times. Patrick then ordered our own copy online, and I wrote the following poem:

Kenneth Branagh as Benedick

In order to be loved
a man must have
golden hair,
good politics,
a quick wit,
slim legs,
a voice like a trumpet.

Hedges must lean
to shelter him,
fountains rise
transparently.
to greet him.

Honor must be his badge,
in his hands
ordinary decency
sit like a bird.

A lot of my poetry is notational -- a kind of journal entry. In this case, I was talking to Lyda Morehouse about Branagh's habit of casting African diaspora actors in untypical roles: Denzel Washington as Don Petro in Much Ado, for example. I ended by saying, that what I liked about Branagh was his golden hair and good politics.

Then I went upstairs and read some Pablo Neruda and wrote this to record my pleasure in the movie and Benedick, who has always been one of my favorite Shakespeare characters, along with Beatrice, of course.

*

And of course one can be loved without golden hair and slim legs, but not (say I) without good politics, honor and ordinary decency.