A Message From You, Britney


Jack Handey Britney Spears. (AP)

Britney Spears has done it again, made contact with us via her Web site. This time in the form of a snippet of poetry and her thoughts on wildlife. The short posting has all the nuance of a high school journal entry, reeking of that teen spirit that informed attempts to assert angst-ridden creative individuality (you remember, it preceded the attendant writer's remorse, humiliation and destruction of said journal).

It's a pitiful little piece of work. My 14-year-old niece could do better than this while battling a summer cold and text messaging three friends simultaneously. If we factor in Britney's other recent gaffes, like a somewhat disjointed interview with Matt Lauer, an abrupt switch to the dark side and a Demi-copying nude magazine cover, one is forced to wonder -- where is Britney's publicist/manager and why isn't this person doing his job?

Still, in the spirit of getting while the getting's good, a decoded version of Britney Spears' latest deep thoughts:

Tigers

Tiger! Tiger! burning bright
In the forests of the night
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry
-- William Blake

Hey y'all, someone gave me a velvet poster of a tiger with these words on it by some dude. I like it because it rhymes, kind of.

In some ways, people are a lot like animals.

Kevin scratches himself and doesn't shower. That's like an animal. What's not is how people have to wear seat belts and put their babies in car seats. It's so unnatural. It's not animal-like, not country, at all.

We all hunger for the same things.

Frappucinos, cheeseburgers, fries. Tigers would like cheeseburgers. I'd like to walk into McDonald's with a tiger and eat cheeseburgers. Then the tiger could jump on a mean photographer and scratch out his eyes.

Love, lust, danger, warmth and adventure.

F'rinstance, my movie "Crossroads" -- it had all of these things. The animals got it.

Like people, animals all have their own rhythm to life.

Do tigers dance? I bet they would to my music.

I'm mesmerized by tigers.

Wait, what does mesmerized mean? It's not dirty, right? It's okay if it is. I just wanna know.

Their eyes, their stripes, their constant quest for survival.

I also have eyes and a quest for survival, but no stripes -- unless you count that one time I had really gnarly highlights.

They almost have a sense of mysteriousness about them.

Like me. I'm so mysterious with my coy public appearances, cryptic interview strategems and Web-published brain droppings.


Behold, the picture of a tiger Brit posted to her Web site. (Screen grab from BritneySpears.com)

They pull you in and make it difficult to look away.

Kind of like that scene in "A Clockwork Orange" where Malcolm McDowell's eyes are forced open and he has to watch bad things. Wouldn't have been so bad if he were watching me sing. Although, I have heard some people are nauseated by my music.

They make you wonder what is behind their gaze.

No one understands the complex creature that is Strong Britney.

A sense of eerie awe comes over you in their presence.

As I myself am awed by Kevin and his creative life force. He just walked in to use the bathroom and I SWEAR I felt eerie awe.

The fear they give you when you pass them is stunning.

People recoil from me in fear all the time. Especially Sean Preston when I head toward him with the car keys.

Okay, I need a really rocking, solid line to finish with...

Behold the beauty of the tiger.

Oh well.

By Liz |  July 20, 2006; 10:44 AM ET  | Category:  Britney Spears , Celebrities
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Taking shots at Britney is so two months ago.

Posted by: Adda | July 20, 2006 1:11 PM

Please have this woman sterilized or wait, like the animals, euthanized. Neither one of them should procreate. She is a fruit.

Posted by: Jan | July 20, 2006 1:31 PM

No, listen guys. She's right. Tigers DO almost have a mysteriousness about them. Almost.

Posted by: Dan | July 20, 2006 1:43 PM

Britney Spears quoting William Blake? I'm sure he's happy about that.

And what's with the writing style? Is she turning this in for homework? This is c-r-a-p. I feel sorry for that kid. It usually takes years to figure out you are smarter than your parents. He's got a head start. I actually feel dumber for reading Britney's dribble and suddenly I'm craving Cheetohs. Someone should seriously fire her PR crew.

In the immortal words of Britney, "This is real, ya'll!" A tiger should maul her for writing this.

Posted by: Some Dude | July 20, 2006 2:40 PM

Someone please --- call CPS and save the children -- save the tigers. Hasn't her fifteen minutes of fame evaporated? The sorry truth is that young people look up(okay,used to) to her and others of her ilk -- oh, the humanity!

Posted by: Polly | July 20, 2006 3:10 PM

I'm sorry, am I reading the Washington Post or a folded up note found in the hallway of a middle school?! The writer of this article obviously has the brain of an immature 13 year old. Find something more interesting to write about....please.

Posted by: Mary | July 20, 2006 3:54 PM

Liz, This is hilarious! Kinda makes you wonder if Gene taught you or you taught Gene...

Posted by: Mike Barrett | July 20, 2006 3:57 PM

LOVE the photo caption.

Posted by: Anonymous | July 20, 2006 4:14 PM

The poem is by Ruddyard Kippling, not William Blake.

Posted by: Anonymous | July 20, 2006 4:17 PM

The citation is the only thing Britney did right - William Blake wrote the poem.

http://www.bartleby.com/101/489.html

Posted by: Not so much ... | July 20, 2006 4:35 PM

Mary, thanks for taking the time out from your busy schedule to comment. What subject did you expect to find in Celebritology, quantum mechanics? Dizzy cow.

Posted by: Ttlsccr | July 20, 2006 4:37 PM

Britney, after reading your poetry the entire world asks that you get neutered immediately have your worthless ex car washer husband spaded.

Posted by: Hunter | July 20, 2006 5:01 PM

Quantum mechanics in ce-britney-ology would give us Schroedinger's Tiger, dead and alive. Sorry, I have been partaking of too much excellent Argentinian Cabernet Sauvignon while looking at assorted space junk entering the atmosphere. Wasn't Britney a cute gal back in the 90's?

Posted by: Heisenberg | July 20, 2006 6:28 PM

I tried very hard to avoid reading this article. Every time I opened up the post site for news updates I saw this thing lingering there, teasing me, daring me to click on it and read it. As disinterested in britney as I am, I have to admit, I just couldn't resist taking a peek at what I figured was sure to be a literary plane crash. Sure enough, reading britney's poem was like watching CNN on 9/11. As painful as it was, I just couldn't look away. Every line was like another person jumping out the window.

Posted by: rubbernecker | July 20, 2006 6:44 PM

Pretty snarky, sniping at Britney. Stopit. Let Britney be Britney.

Posted by: Britney'slegionofsuperheroes | July 20, 2006 6:47 PM

I thought that Washington Post was a NEWS broadcast site? When did blogging and acting like a 13 year old get defined as news. Oh wait, it didn't.

Come on Washington Post - fads come and go, but you're a credible news site; stick with the news.

And I've seen better blogs written by 12 year olds. Don't quit your day job (reminder: reporting real news).

Posted by: What is this crud? | July 20, 2006 7:29 PM

I, for one, am looking forward to dating a post-kfed brittany. He seems to be about 3 weeks from going back to dancing for a living.

Damn him, he's got me to the point where I'm starting to feel sorry for Brittany. I hate him for that.

Posted by: Bunkley | July 20, 2006 8:11 PM

just so you know, the subtitle for this article on THE FRONT PAGE OF THE POST:

"The bride of 'Fed'-enstein has addressed her lieges through poetry."

is incorrect. I believe you mean to say "legions." "Lieges" are something totally different...

Posted by: J | July 20, 2006 8:22 PM

this is the worst crap i've ever read. and i'm not talking about britney's poetry. granted that's not the best poem i've seen, but to go over it line-by-line drooling and ridiculing it is mean-spirited and excessive. report on celebrities, joke about celebrities, but don't be vicious. it's not kind, it's not funny, it's not news, and it makes you look dumber than britney.

Posted by: puddlejumper | July 20, 2006 10:35 PM

No, it's not mean spirited.

Let's sit back, take a breath here and think this all out like someone with a bit of a brain might.

Right now in some part of the town you live in, there is a young woman who is beautiful, honest, loving, caring, talented, etc etc. And you don't care!

But Brittany you care about. Why is that? Is it because she's all those things I mentioned? No. You love her because she's a celebrity. You don't know her any more than the anonymous girl I mentioned in the last paragraph, but you care about her enough to yell at poor old liz (a girl who is also, beautiful, talented, honest, loving, caring and more!) just for pointing out that while brittany may be attractive, famous, and reasonably talented, she can't write poetry.

Now here's where this is hard to think through and you're struggling here a bit, so let me help you. You don't know Brittany. You may project a certain personality on her, but it's a guess in the way that I imagine that if a SI Swimsuit model met me, she'd be charmed and might be interested in "dating" me (heh).

Now, we've established that (a) Brittany is famous (b) you don't know much about her. Let's further say (c) we know what goofy things she does such as (d) marrying a gigalo who is spending her money faster than she's earning it right now (e) Having babies faster than China (f) is so bored she's writing poetry (g) thinks it means something (h) doesn't get that it's bad poetry (i) and thinks we should care about it.

So we've established that she's arrogant. Not arrogant in the way that a Warren Beatty might be, but arrogant in the way that a "Mariah Carey" is, in that she believes the world revolves around her and that we care what she thinks.

All of that is reasonably okay, but it is funny that you defend Brittany like you know her, all the while, all you know is what you read in the paper just like the rest of us, so really, you don't know jack about Brittany and yet you defend her.

Ergo, you're a moron. I mean that in the "thoughtless" category rather than the "chunk of brain missing because of war injury" way that might give you a reasonable chance of explaining away your "thought process".

Posted by: Bradley | July 20, 2006 11:34 PM

che, why do you insist on posting news articles on the celeb blog? It's more than annoying to have to scroll past that when I am just looking for my daily Britney fix. ;)

Posted by: Southern Maryland | July 21, 2006 10:20 AM

J:

liege Audio pronunciation of "lieges" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (lj)
n.

1. A lord or sovereign to whom allegiance and service are due according to feudal law.
2. A vassal or subject owing allegiance and services to a lord or sovereign under feudal law.
3. A loyal subject to a monarch.

This sounds right, in that context, to me.

Posted by: S | July 21, 2006 10:31 AM

Damn, I was hoping my comments would have offended somebody enough to complain. I was going for that "uncensored" vibe.

For those of you who are mad at Liz Kelly, lighten up. This blog thing is clearly not written for an audience interested exclusively in legitimate news. I mean the name of the blog is celebritology. What were you expecting when you clicked on the link?

Besides, she's right on. If Britney Spears wants to post her retard babble on the internet for the world to read, she should be prepared to receive criticism. I mean seriously, that dribble was the kind of thing you scribble into the middle of your psych 101 notebook at one in the morning after you just broke up with your high school boyfriend, contemplating how you can use your undergrad degree to rescue the world from itself. And then a few years after you've graduated and you're working as a temp in a file room somewhere, hating life and contemplating how you can use your undergrad degree to get a real job, you find yourself going through and throwing out all your beerbongs and beads from your freshman dorm room, when you stumble across your warped, sun-stained psych notebook. You flip through to find your hyperoptimistic epiphany, hoping it might rekindle some spark of activistic ambition, and find something like what Brittney wrote. How dissapointing.

Fortunately for Britney Spears though, she is in that pop star celebrity bubble, resting comfortably on a mountain of cash, and may never find herself in the position where she would be embarassed by some of the naive things she did in her twenties. She's living a charmed, consequence-free life, and I think the average person out there has every right to feel a little bitter and to vent about it in a silly web blog.

Ok, I'm done. Get mad.

Posted by: rubbernecker | July 21, 2006 10:52 AM

I am wondering if she gets her ideas from her old "Highlights" issues that are stashed under her bed...

I am sure she likes to have "fun with a purpose"...

Posted by: ohmyohmyohmymymy | July 21, 2006 11:57 AM

all this time i thought you was just you. that you didnt need to cover up behind anything or copy anyone, yet you have done bot. youv covered up under the tiger copied demi. why? your eyes have a bit of tiger in them and dimi has already embarked on the nude baby scene which i thought was tasteless. a body is yours. with child even more your your. yours. your showing something that child may not want shown. that is something between mother and child and mother and world. thought just because your blond, you had much more since then that. janie

Posted by: brittany | July 25, 2006 8:14 AM

Yeah this is just as good as her talking about Time Travel. Boy K-Whatever really did a number on her by getting her into Drugs. Caption: This is the reason why you don't do Drugs Kids!

Posted by: BritneysStupid | August 23, 2006 1:42 AM

She's an Idiot! Save Me...Please. I think she might eat me by accident.

Posted by: SeanPrestonSpearsFederline | August 23, 2006 1:49 AM

The lives of you and your families are at stake b/c the world is in turmoil and you go and waste your time talking about Britney Spears who doesn't pay your bills, doesn't know you and your problems, and probably would do nothing to help you if she knew! She's got her own if you haven't noticed!
Wake up people! It's sad that intelligent and articulate people such as yourselves talk about someone who is not apart of reality, let alone rip each other's comments apart. What a waste of time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by: sfpresidio | August 24, 2006 2:53 PM

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