I For One

 

A friend from my childhood

says she is waiting  for my next

novel.  I wrote back that I don’t

think that’s going to happen,

not that I don’t enjoy writing

narrative.  Novels, after all, grow

day-by-day like house plants and

provide a satisfaction much like

a gardener  who wins the best

American Rose must feel.

But poems are different and

sneak in through the back door,

so no blue ribbons or loving cups

for them.  Still, from the kitchen,

the poet can watch the swells

on the dance floor while wearing

his Che Guevara T-shirt and

munching  on little crust less

sandwiches he filches  from

shoulder-level trays as they

whisk by.

All in all,

the poet is a subversive, bad

mouthed jerk.  When the kitchen

staff – who speak no English –

finally throw him out, he probably

pisses in the flowers while making

faces in the picture window.

I for one have no idea why I

am writing poetry save this

made thing here.  Do you?

FG  10/19/2014

Gail Morgrage is the one who wondered about my next novel.  She is one of five people who may have read my last book.

I dislike Che Guevara.

The poem as a “made thing” was poet Natasha Trethewey comment on the Newshour.