Halfway down the Danube

Some Lorine Niedecker

The great Wisconsin poet. We're not usually thought of as a poetic people. Well, we aren't. But the impulse is still there. From the New Goose:

On Columbus Day he set out for the north
to inspect his forty acres,
brought back a plaster of Paris deer-head
and food from the grocers and bakers,

a wall-thermometer to tell if he's cold,
a new kind of paring knife,
and painted in red, a bluebottle gentian
for the queen, his wife.

And another from the same collection:

For sun and moon and radio
farmers pay dearly;
their natural resource: turn
the world off early.

And one from her later Homemade/Handmade Poems:

Consider at the outset:
to be thin for thought
or thick cream blossomy

Many things are better
flavored with bacon

Sweet Life, My love:
didn't you ever try
this delicacy -- the marrow
in the bone?

And don't be afraid
to pour wine over cabbage

It nicely encapsulates the Wisconsin philosophy of life. (Especially the fourth and fifth lines.)