by Kevin T McEneaney
It is hard to write poetry
at a conference about poetry.
The doctors have their scalpels,
their comparisons, their theories,
their illustrative computer slides,
rhythms analyzed for texture,
syntax X-rayed for microscopic cancer,
eloquence with shadowy ambiguity,
and a tsunami of rippling words.
The poet is either a saint or insane.
*
The history of poetry is a thunderstorm,
or the trickling of a singing stream
with blooming Queen Anne’s lace,
as well as ugly weeds like mugwort
which eventually die of exhaustion….
*
The agony and the ecstasy of writing
is as sublime as watching cumlous clouds.
