{"id":6620,"date":"2025-04-11T12:12:21","date_gmt":"2025-04-11T17:12:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/?p=6620"},"modified":"2025-04-11T12:12:21","modified_gmt":"2025-04-11T17:12:21","slug":"perfection-wasted-john-updikes-poetic-self-assessment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/2025\/04\/11\/perfection-wasted-john-updikes-poetic-self-assessment\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Perfection Wasted’: John Updike’s poetic self-assessment"},"content":{"rendered":"

On the Best American Poetry blog, the April 10, 2025 entry<\/a> was John Updike’s “Perfection Wasted,” a poem written when the author was dying of lung cancer.<\/p>\n

Perfection Wasted
\n<\/strong>And another regrettable thing about death
\nis the ceasing of your own brand of magic,
\nwhich took a whole life to develop and market \u2014
\nthe quips, the witticisms, the slant
\nadjusted to a few, those loved ones nearest
\nthe lip of the stage, their soft faces blanched
\nin the footlight glow, their laughter close to tears,
\ntheir tears confused with their diamond earrings,
\ntheir warm pooled breath in and out with your heartbeat,
\ntheir response and your performance twinned.
\nThe jokes over the phone. The memories packed
\nin the rapid-access file. The whole act.
\nWho will do it again? That’s it: no one;
\nimitators and descendants aren’t the same.<\/p>\n

(included in\u00a0Endpoint and Other Poems<\/em><\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the Best American Poetry blog, the April 10, 2025 entry was John Updike’s “Perfection Wasted,” a poem written when the author was dying of lung cancer. Perfection Wasted And another regrettable thing about death is the ceasing of your … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":818,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-updike-quoted","category-updikes-life-times"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/818"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6620"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6620\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6622,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6620\/revisions\/6622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/johnupdikesociety\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}