There’s much to
be said about writing an invective – telling someone or something off using
written rather than vocal language. In literature, an invective is an angry, critical or abusive tirade directed at
someone or something. For example, here’s an invective by Shakespeare: “A
knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats; a base, proud, shallow, beggarly,
three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy worsted-stocking knave; a lily-livered,
action-taking, whoreson, glass-gazing, super-serviceable, finical rogue;
one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a bawd in way of good service,
and art nothing but the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pander, and the
son and heir to a mongrel bitch: one whom I will beat into clamorous whining if
thou deni'st the least syllable of thy addition.” (from The Tragedy of King
Lear, II.2)
Invective poetry
is rooted in ancient Greece, but the genre gained its greatest popularity in
ancient Rome. Originally, invective poems included denunciatory or abusive
language that attacked political and public figures with a somewhat sardonic or
satirical tone. Most early invectives were written anonymously; however,
Catullus, Cicero, and Juvenal publicly “owned” the invectives they wrote (some
of which, especially by Catullus, are quite explicit). Of course, early
invectives had a rhetorical context and a hermeneutic that have been lost, and
today’s invective poems are usually presented in the spirit of lampoons (poetic
burlesque).
One well-known invective poem is "Invective Against Swans" by Wallace Stevens.
Another is the moralistic "An Invective Against Gold" by Anne Kelligrew, written during the 1600s.
My
absolute favorite invective poem is “Invective Against the Bumblebee” written by New Jersey
poet Diane Lockward (from her prize-winning book “What Feeds Us”). Click here to order What Feeds Us.
The poem
(reprinted by permission of the author) follows.
INVECTIVE AGAINST THE BUMBLEBEE
By Diane Lockward
Escapee from a
tight cell, yellow-streaked,
sex-deprived
sycophant to a queen,
you have dug
divots in my yard
and like a
squatter trespassed in my garage.
I despise you
for you have swooped down
on my baby boy,
harmless on a blanket of lawn,
his belly
plumping through his orange stretch suit,
yellow hat over
the fuzz of his head.
Though you
mistook him for a sunflower,
I do not
exonerate you,
for he weeps in
my arms, trembles, and drools,
finger swollen
like a breakfast sausage.
Now my son
knows pain.
Now he fears
the grass.
Fat-assed
insect! Perverse pedagogue!
Henceforth, may
flowers refuse to open for you.
May cats chase
you in the garden.
I want you
shellacked by rain, pecked by shrikes,
mauled by
skunks, paralyzed by early frost.
May farmers
douse your wings with pesticide.
May you never
again taste the nectar
of purple
clover or honeysuckle.
May you pass by
an oak tree just in time
to be pissed on
by a dog.
And tomorrow
may you rest on my table
as I peruse the
paper. May you shake
beneath the
scarred face of a serial killer.
May you be
crushed by the morning news.
Click here to hear Diane read "Invective Against the Bumblebee."
Or better yet, click hear to watch the new "movie" on Diane's blog.
Or better yet, click hear to watch the new "movie" on Diane's blog.
Now … who or what has made you angry? Has there been a
memorable anger-inducing person or event in your life? Write an invective poem
in which you give someone or something the proverbial “hell.” Consider both
humor and fury. Stamp your metaphorical feet, shout in written language, and
write your rage.
