Ode To Metadata

Posted March 1, 2017 by Amanda Pizzollo

We’ve reached that time in the semester that I refer to as the grind. It’s not overwhelming, it’s not all time-consuming, but it is a grind. Read, write, exercise (cataloging exercises, not the sweatin’ to the oldies kind), repeat. And so, I need a grind break. Therefore, this blog post will be a poem- a bad poem.

Ode to metadata

We learn all about you,
data about data,
and then we learn quickly-
that that don’t come near to explaining ya’

You’re the label on the can of soup.
The title of a book,
the stuff we need to know to find that
for which we look.

You help us keep stuff separate;
and so, we can lump things together.
Because of you, I run a search,
and find all the books written about leather.

You’re the love notes to ourselves,
and to future library fellers.
So that we know how to take care
of the treasures in our cellars.

Without you
I would not know who took this pic,
or if it’s of a magic wand
or just a wayward stick.

So here’s to you metadata
because I never met a data
I didn’t like.

~Manda