i
Who knows what the artist intended
Can interpret the goose pimples
Left by so many dangling participles
Or lasso the herds of uncivilized emotions
In Freud's backyard?
Love is neither the only
Subject nor intention
For a poem,
However erotic
The orchid
Or seductive the pastures
Of wildflower poems.
Nor can a poem
Reflect reality,
Except for
Scientific poems
Constructed of mirrors,
Aligned by skilled optometrists.
And poems know nothing
Of politics
Though at times
They scream.
A poem can sing
The dreams and prayers
of earth and angels.
The highest, finest truth
That can be
Known.
ii
Poems are a life-form of the heart––
Gutsy, intractable creatures of the mind––
Feathery, flying contraptions
Built of words.
iii
If Aristotle imagined
That a poem is
“A thing made,”
A poet knows
That a poem is
“A thing born,”
In an unholy series
Of remarkable convulsions
Writhing contractions
Of images and sounds.
iv
The poem
Is a foetus
Wrestling to be born
A fire
Wanting to consume
A dragon
Wishing to devour
The moon.
v
Poetry is the human heart
With a voice––
Meaning beyond the mind.
Desire beneath the prayer.
Poetry is the whispering Word
Of the thoughts of God
Waiting in silence
Growing in power
Creating worlds
With euphonious sounds.