If, like me, you're sick of searching for literally anything on the internet only to be bombarded, against your will, by AI summaries, stick around, because I've got something you're going to love. I recently encountered a poem by writer Kelly Link that perfectly captures the rage I feel when unwanted AI is shoved down my throat. It's my new favorite poem, made even better because it's based on one of my all-time faves, William Carlos Williams' 1934 classic, "This Is Just To Say."
Kelly Link posted the poem on her Bluesky page last month. It goes:
This Is Just To Say
I have turned off
the AI features
that were in
the update
and which
you were probably
hoping
to monetize
Fuck you
they were stupid
so unnecesary
and so annoying
It's pure perfection, right? Enjoy! I hope you love it like I do! I'm going to memorize it and mutter it under my breath at every opportune moment.
Kelly Link, who has been a Pulitzer finalist and a MacArthur Fellow, is the owner of the independent bookstore Book Moon Books in Easthampton, Massachusetts. She is the author of several collections of short stories, as well as the novel The Book of Love, which Brooklyn Rail describes as a "terrifying contemplation on grief and loss and death and power." Last summer, Penny Magic included Link on their list of "Five Bookish Accounts to Follow on Bluesky" if you're an avid reader.
Learn more about Kelly Link on her website, and follow Kelly Link on Bluesky, where she states that she will recommend books to anyone who tells her two writers they love and what kind of book or genre they're in the mood for. How cool! Thanks, Kelly!
Previously:
• Kelly Link and Gavin Grant have bought a bookstore!
• Kelly Link's short story collection Magic for Beginners as a free CC download — magnificent, weird, award-winning speculative fiction for free
• Kelly Link's 'Magic for Beginners' – knockout short story collection
• Where would you put the word 'fuck' in William Carlos Williams's 'This is Just to Say'?
• William Carlos Williams's 'This is Just to Say'
