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"The Bill Shakespeare of pigskin" Nelson is the author of “Packers ‘Verses’ Vikings: A Poetic Perspective,” which is scheduled for publication Dec. 16. Yes, you read that right: The book uses poetry to examine the annual Minnesota-Wisconsin football game.
Nelson is a genuinely jovial man, punctuating most answers with a weighty guffaw, and, having grown up in Dairyland, Wis., he is a bona fide “Packer backer.” His home is decked out with every conceivable piece of Packer merchandise, from a Christmas tree sporting team ornaments to autographs, mugs and posters. He has so many Packer collectibles, in fact, that his den was featured in the Duluth News Tribune for its raw glory. “It’s hard not to get swallowed up in the whole thing,” Nelson said. “I don’t know what it is, and I really haven’t seen that in anything else.” He remembers his first foray into Packer-Viking poetry as if it were yesterday. It was late 1989 and the Vikings had just acquired Herschel Walker from Dallas. Earlier in the season, the Cowboys had squared off against the Pack, but to no avail. So, when Walker’s first game against Green Bay in a purple jersey came up, Nelson wasn’t expecting much from him. “I was pretty uppity going into the game, and, of course, he just absolutely devastated the Packers,” he said. With Walker’s help, the Vikings won 26-14. “I was driving home, back up here, and, for whatever reason, started thinking about the song ‘Oh! Susanna,’” Nelson said. “I started singing, ‘Herschel Walker / Runs through any crack.’” He ended up rewriting the entire song. After sharing it with a few coworkers and friends, he realized it was something people enjoyed, so he typed it up and passed it around. The poems started trickling in until the next season, when the idea snowballed and his latest posted poem was a weekly sight at the office. “It’s kind of been fun,” he said. “It’s really spread out as time has gone by.” Nelson was content just sharing them with people he knew (and the occasional Internet message board), but that all changed when his met his wife, Debbie. Ever the motivator, she searched for every last poem, urging him to publish the results of her scavenger hunt. “Because of the fact that she had a different word processing program than I did, she hand retyped most of ’em,” he said, laughing. To flush out the final product, the two have also solicited fan photos — from both sides, to be fair. But that doesn’t necessarily mean the lyrical content is entirely balanced. He credits living in Twin Ports, straddling the border, for any animosity. “I may not have been as generous to Vikings fans as I could’ve been in my poems,” Nelson said. “I thought maybe I could sell this in the Cities too, but reading them as I was editing, I was like, ‘Um, maybe not.’” He can’t quite explain the “exuberant” nature of Packer fans, but finds it intriguing. “If you wear a piece of Packer clothes, someone will talk to you,” he said. “People who like the Packers really like the Packers, and will happily tell you about it.” He said he was even approached in Las Vegas by a number of fans after he put on one of his many pieces of Packer attire. “Football’s kind of a universal language, especially among guys,” Nelson said. “Guys just don’t communicate like normal people. … If you can talk about football, you can talk to any guy, any place, any time.” For more information on Carl Nelson and his poetry, check out http://www.packersversesvikings.com/.
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