Out of the Running

Robert Frost has been disqualified in the Pretentiousness 400 Meter Individual Medley after it was discovered he had been taking knowledge cavalierly when recent testing for illogical substances came up positive.

Scholars and artists thrown together are often annoyed at the puzzle of where they differ. Both work from knowledge; but I suspect they differ most importantly in the way their knowledge is come by. Scholars get theirs with conscientious thoroughness along projected lines of logic; poets theirs cavalierly and as it happens in and out of books. They stick to nothing deliberately; but let what will stick to them like burrs where they walk in the fields.

Officials who have asked to remain nameless have complained that such performance-enhancing absurdity is detrimental to the sport of literary criticism. They have made a show of cracking down, but acknowledge that cheating remains rampant. Testing techniques and technologies have closed the illogicality gap over the years but poets have managed to stay one step ahead. “They’re like computer viruses. They just keep coming up with some new craziness.”