When I need to make sense of it all, I go back to the beginning.
I throw out the poetry textbooks and all my lecture notes.
I ignore the voice in my head that keeps repeating “imagery,
cadence, structure and rhyme”.
I go back to Bluebird and Roll the Dice. I go back to that place
where my passion was born, where the muse first gave me a wink
and the gods showed me words that could kick like a mule
and kiss me like no woman I had ever known.
I forget about submission guidelines and contributors’ copies.
I pour myself a tall glass of cheap scotch cut with ice
and drink until I don’t give a shit, until I’m ready to wipe my ass
with rejection letters and can vomit up years of advice.
It’s then that I remember the women I’ve fucked
and the ones that have fucked me. I think about the pain
and failure that's refined me, then I take another sip and say
“but I’m still here”, and I smile at the gentle tinkle of ice and glass.
SMG
I ignore the voice in my head that keeps repeating “imagery,
cadence, structure and rhyme”.
I go back to Bluebird and Roll the Dice. I go back to that place
where my passion was born, where the muse first gave me a wink
and the gods showed me words that could kick like a mule
and kiss me like no woman I had ever known.
I forget about submission guidelines and contributors’ copies.
I pour myself a tall glass of cheap scotch cut with ice
and drink until I don’t give a shit, until I’m ready to wipe my ass
with rejection letters and can vomit up years of advice.
It’s then that I remember the women I’ve fucked
and the ones that have fucked me. I think about the pain
and failure that's refined me, then I take another sip and say
“but I’m still here”, and I smile at the gentle tinkle of ice and glass.
SMG
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