Fresno Famous

What has the Material Girl called Madonna never been before? Answer: a great literary poem. Well, now she is one. Peter Reynosa, who is a former graduate of Fresno State, has written a poem about Madonna in a traditonal style that attempts to do with no others have done: make a poem worthy of intellectual discussion about Madonna. Madonna may have accomplished many things, but until now she has never been what anyone would call written about in a serious poem.

The poem is written in 19th century style English Romanticism, even though Reynosa says it is not a Romantic poem. It is written with a lot of Old English words, but it deals with many contemporary issues. Actually, the poem is made up of four stanzas: the first stanza talks about her attacking tradition, the second stanzas mentions how she is the embodiment of feminism, the third stanza discusses her sexuality, and the fourth stanza praises her for her religious veiws and her msyticism. When asked why he chose to write a traditonal-style poem about Madonna, Reynosa responded: "I thought she was worthy of being in a great poem. And I love the traditional style of creating a poem. But even though it is written like a poem that was penned over two centuries ago it still deals with many modern issues that have confronted Madonna." When queried what was a difficult part of writing "O Madonna", Reynosa said: "Deciding on what to focus on. I don't think her music or her acting or her fame is worth writing about, but I thought her going against tradition, being an icon for feminism, her sexuality, and her mystic views  were very important." And the poem is very complimentary to Madonna, except when the poem discusses her sex life, here the poem both praises and is very critical of her." Talking about Madonna's sexuality was hard because I wanted to be honest. That is why I praise her for attacking Victorian hypocrisy and Puritan smugness, but am also critical of her for being a little too sexually shallow and trivial.

Asked if he thought Madonna would hate or love the poem, he said: "I hope she loves it,  but then don't we all want to be in a great poem?" The  video for the poem was created by a British company and the voice in the video belong's to a British man. And the same British company put it up on Youtube. Reynosa is trying to work a deal out with a certain Fresno establishment so he can do his first public reading of the poem in Fresno. "I would love to do my first public reading of it somewhere in Fresno."