Two Couplets

Opinions On Art

I just read opinions

From some people who are poets,

Or think they are.

I finally believe

Opinions are a bore in poetry.

Like art is not a gift.

And everybody is a poet.

And inspiration's an anachronism.

A typhoon in the Philippines,

And Christie got elected.

I don't need this further aggravation.

None of them's a poet,

Not because they don't know how.

Art is what you are,

Not what you learn.

11-14-13

Rage

I think my verse is good,

And so does everyone who writes,

And absolutely most of them

Are absolutely wrong.

They buy themselves a pen and think,

“Another Keats is born!”
Although they lack the talent and have

Never read the first one.

Now Keats is from the gutter

And the country's gone to hell,

And everybody loves the man

Who hasn't any talent.

11-14-13

 

Wishes

A world without a homophobe,

And honesty starts fights,

Republicans and Christie,

And people run red lights -

Where paradise is mortal,

Insanities accrue,

The universe is gentle,

And every friend is true -

11-14-13

Capitulation

How many educated men

Put paper underneath a pen

Since Puccini, Brooke, Millay,

And thought they had so much to say

They could dispense with meter, rhyme

And rhythm? It's a little crime

Beside what comes to Scotland Yard.

Wish it and you are a bard.

I was told I have no gift.

Between myself and art the rift

Could not be mended, bridged or healed.

I wrote nothing that appealed.

Now I see in 50 years

The widened chasm that appears

Separates today from then,

The loss of all I might have been.

The poet hating all he does -

The gentle love of art that was.

The delusion and the curse!

Every poet loves his verse.

11-14-13

 

Two Couplets

Be a friend. Renounce, refuse

The the mark, the myth, the lie, the ruse.

Be a friend. Resistance sucks.

Love my heart. Forget my bucks.

11-13-13