performance-enhanced poetics

PoPEDs

With Lance Armstrong’s long-anticipated admission that he secretly ‘doped’ for years while competing at a high level in various international cycling events, it has come to light that other lesser known pursuits have also been influenced by this illicit practice. Recently there have been news reports stating that “even poets have begun taking various performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs).” Among this new class of pharmaceuticals (often referred to as PoPEDs in the underground marketplace) it has been shown by urine tests, administered at random both in dingy restrooms of coffeehouses and in spotless university lavatories, that poets are increasingly experimenting with and using without prescription, the following trade-name drugs—

Iambian: This drug is said to cause the blood to pulse audibly in perfect iambic beats within the brain, which is said to lead directly to highly regular metrical compositions. As a possible side effect, some users have reported that their love-making has fallen into a fairly boring style.

Rimon: A derivative form of Echoal, this drug increases the ability to hear words in rhyming pairs. A common side effect is an inability to speak at length without going into a sing-song mode, otherwise it has been shown safe and effective, elective, erective detective…

Contestin: Although clinical trials have not shown the same results, users of this drug claim that their minds are able to control, from great distances, the selections made by contest screeners and judges. Side effects are mild, though some heavy users have reported a persistent ringing in their ears that sounds like Charlie Sheen repeating, “Winning. I’m, winning!”

Realitonine: Perhaps the most controversial of this class of drugs, this particular PED has been known to cause the user “to really believe” certain dire and life-altering events really happened to him/her. Confessional poetry of a very high (shriek level) order often results after using this drug, which, by convention, is mainlined with a hypodermic needle. So alarming is this practice, the Poetry Foundation has given hundreds of thousands in support of local needle exchange programs. Side effects: Estrangement from relatives and friends, visible tracks along the inner arm, as well as thoughts of suicide.

trope dope

It's easy for poets to get hooked on that trope dope.

pharmacological language

The poem as pharmacological language.