I’m not familiar with Kooser’s work, Derb, but I posted that poem when I came across it the other day because it seemed of a piece with the interview he gave to the Times–wry, pleasant, and amusing. Nothing more than that, but certainly that, which, after all, ain’t nothing.

Parse the poem? Claim that it makes the Muse weep? To paraphrase your denunciation of the overreaction to Martha Stewart’s misdeeds, As well break a butterfly on the wheel.