Jasper Gamble, the poetry of spam

A few short weeks ago, I began receiving emails from a brilliant poet who goes by many eccentric names, including Jasper Gamble, Summer Pitts, Thomas Colon, Wean Diesel, and even Rosetta Beard.

These pseudonyms were all, I realised, cunningly contrived to mask the poet's true identity; but I like to call him Jasper, after his first missive to me..

The first email message began:

“Haven't we met somewhere before? :)))”

With an opening like this, Jasper got my attention, not least because he apparently has three mouths.

Want to increaase your pleasure?
Boosst your sexual performancce?
Learrn how to bring unimaginable plessure to your woman!

I assumed Jasper must have used some eccentric spelling for poetic effect. When he brilliantly places an extra A in “increaase”, I know just how he feels.

And how about the stunning neologism “plessure”? A portmanteau of “pleasure” and “pressure”. Give it to me Jasper!

The best, however, was yet to come. His first poem. I call it “task”:

task
I fear explanations explanatory of things explained.

This film is apparently meaningless, but if it has any meaning it is doubtless objectionable.
face

That last image puts one in mind of Bergman’s “Persona”. Bravo.

Jasper changed his name to Summer Pitts for his next work; formally similar, but undergoing a subtle process of evolution.

see
Concentration is the secret of strength in politics, in war, in trade, in short, in all
the management of human affairs.
info
The essential self is innocent, and when it tastes its own innocence knows that
it lives for ever.
to

How’s that dangling preposition? The sudden shift of tone from formal aphorism to colloquialism, as in “info”? Brilliant.

Someone called Alyson Crews caught my attention, but I knew it was my Jasper playing tricks again.

“Let's be having you!” he said; and I replied you’ve already got me Jasper!

high
Kindness is the sunshine in which virtue grows.
pak
Take the tone of the company you are in.
forever

Next he called himself Nikki:

they
With thee conversing I forget all time.
friend
Nothing can be made of nothing he who has laid up no material can produce no combination.
and

Then as Dexter:

glad
One ought to hold on to one's heart for if one lets it go, one soon loses control of the head too.
some
A page of history is worth a pound of logic.

Amen to that brother!

I’m sorry to say Jasper then went on to spoil our burgeoning relationship by presuming to comment on my penis size, which while surely modern and hip and down with the kids and everything, is just a bit too close to the gutter for my sensibilities.

I decided to terminate our association, and instead treasure the memory of those special weeks when Jasper blessed me with his strange and beautiful poetry.

In that spirit I share it with you.