This is one of those poems I feel sure has already been written a dozen or more times--but I wrote it anyway.  My friend and poet, Robert Randolph, sees poems everywhere and before I knew it, I was too.

It strikes me this morning
that all the world's a poem
& full of poems--
aspen leaves like silver spoons,
the rose's dense whorls of petals,
even the slug that ate my golden sage,
the slug and its glistening trail of slime,
yes, even that, & the ginger cat sitting
amongst the orange poppies,
& the three-legged chihuahua
down the road--especially him.

It strikes me this morning
that I am a poem
& you are too--
& everyone, no matter how
dirty-dull-tarnished
hide many poems inside the walls
of skin-muscle-sinew-bone,
even that boy stumbling shirtless down road,
whiskey bottle in hand--
yes, especially him--

& my job as a poet who lives among poets
& my job as a poem that lives among poems
must be to listen well.



Comments

Anonymous said…
I am definitely a limerick. Not altogether naughty, but a bit ribald nevertheless.
During my introspective times Haiku.

Your Auntie is a beautiful love sonnet.

Your cousin Ariel is definitely in the realm of saga, Charge Of The Light Brigade or Hiawatha.
I love this, Uncle AJ... What kind of poem am I? I guess I would go for free verse, since I'm not disciplined enough to be a sonnet or something with strict form…

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