The One For Whom It All Makes Sense
I have written a thousand poems for you
that have never
left my room.
They fill the pages of notebooks
stacked high on a shelf
no one can reach.
Orphans they are, beggars
afraid they are not
noble enough for the King,
would never make it
past the guards.
I make a vain attempt to dress them up,
disguise their ridiculous origins,
but still they smell bad.
Even so, there are times, late at night,
when they think I'm asleep,
I can almost hear them talking to each other,
conjuring rude ways to make it to your court.
Oh, the arguments they have!
The brawls!
Some of them actually believe
all they need is a shower and a shave.
Others, unsure of who they are
or might have been,
insist on practicing, all night long,
their perfect way of greeting you.
Oh sure, there is much to be said
for these backroom bards,
these trouble makers,
these arm wrestling vagrants from another world.
Indeed, if I was dead,
my ambitious biographer, after paying his respects
to my dear, sweet wife,
would borrow them just long enough
to search for pearls,
find the perfect turn of phrase,
the sudden storm of brilliance
even my harshest critics would have to praise.
He'd think of clever little titles for the tome,
describing, in his mournfully halting way,
the "man who left his muse too soon"
or some such thing
that might make you wonder
why I never gave these poems you --
the one for whom it all makes sense
even when it doesn't.
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at October 17, 2008 08:29 PM
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