Putting Your Hoof Where Your Mouth Is

 

I kept telling you 

Poets are poets only 

When writing and at 

No other time should they 

Pretend they are anything

But that, but time and time 

Again that never stopped you 

From running off at the mouth 

Before that inexhaustible 

Stream of meandering, 

Fumbling unconsciousness, 

Right or wrong, your raison d'état-— 

No matter where the others were at.

 

 

 

The Ultimate Artful Con

 

Just for the time 

Being, what say we 

Put behind us that ingenious 

 

Spiel which wants us 

Placed here to make life better 

Than we found it, 

 

And work instead on 

Putting more of that life in 

To the body of our work, 

 

That is to say, 

Less artistry to see 

How much better 

 

We all look. 

 

 

 

To Sleep Amidst Other Things Amiss

 

Dear diddling nocturnal day-

Dream emitting artists— 

 

Lack of a good night’s sleep 

Should never be an excuse 

 

For waking up dead 

To the world and crowing 

 

“See? I can still cock and doodle, too!" 

 

 

 

 

 

Not Bloody Up To It This Time Around

—after Archilochos, poet and mercenary 

 

[MS SHOWING CONSIDERABLE WEAR AND TEAR] 

 

[ ] 

[ ]

by the way [far?] 

[ ] [ ] 

[ ] [ ] flung side

[ ] [ ]

ditched [ ] [ ] rusty 

[ ] 

[ ]  

[ ]

shield going [where to?] pieces still 

 

[MS QUALITY RAPIDLY FADING] 

 

[ ] 

[ ] 

[ ] 

[ ] wait [for?] better war[ri?][or] 

[ ] 

[ ] 

[ ] 

[ ] poet? 

 

[MS WHOLLY IN SHAMBLES] 

 

[ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] 

[ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] 

[ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ]

[ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] 

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Oxymoronic

--after Heraclitus, again 

 

Nothing remains 

Unchanged, no matter how 

 

Many times 

You have heard it 

 

Uttered by the well-

Meaning masses,

 

By this babbling

Brook, it bears

 

Repeating just the same.