Where Do I Fall?
The written word carries significance
Some use it to instruct and say
“Knowledge is power” (Bacon)
Others, they write down history
Convey myths passed through the ages
Homer, my friend, I’m looking at you
Where do I fall in ages hence
Since ancient dactylic hexameter
And the Shakespearian sonnet?
As scraps of notepaper scribbled
In the middle of the darkness
Accumulate in bookmarks placed
Between the many pages of
The more famous poets
Bound in the best indicator
Of worth--Post-copyright publication
Sometimes a fantasy someone
Leaves their own scribbled ripped up scraps
In imagined pages of mine
Inspired by great combinations
Of twenty-six letters in
Organized eleven point type
But those thoughts lie in bed after
My pen stops being so darn shy
And scampers out of bookbag’s depths
Between midnight inspiration
Like the moon peeking between clouds
And a blinding bedside lamp
By then I am too lazy to
Even roll away from warm blankets
When no one looks, I write to muse
To myself and my own Muse
Who lends her hand to shape my thoughts
Sometimes a proud marble pillar
And sometimes a humble clay pot
Admitted few, are to my museum
And I, the curator, can polish
When they need be put on display
The ink flows best at certain times
When ozone like turpentine fills
The air, and loosens thoughts a bit
Fast fingers fly keyboard
When upset emotions need shared
Unable to explain in prose
Which requires punctuation
That’s blurred on the keyboard by tears
They’re conveyed by the stanzas made
By hitting Enter frantically
The right side of the brain, saturated
Bleeds into the left hemisphere
Where words like building blocks are stored
And late night dizziness mixes
Colors and grammar into a
Poetic Lego tower that
Needs be kicked over a bit
And then rebuilt in cold coffee
Logic of ten in the morning
So where do I fall in?
Between Wordsworth and Frost’s famous
Yellow picturesque nature scenes
How can i Compare to Cummings’
Unique use of Capitalization?
My social experiences will
Never have Neruda’s roughness
And all the notepaper bookmarks
Will never add to Dickinson’s
Total of seventeen hundred
But I write for myself sometimes
And my friends on occasion too
And I think that it is enough
To bring a smile to someone’s face
At four in the morning with
A demure doodle of some words.