Trolo
04-15-03, 12:33 PM
A foot, captive beneath the leg that straddles it. Dirty-soled shoe.
She frees her foot from its entrapment and drops it to the floor, coupled now with her other.
Black sneakers with white socks. Khaki cargoes rolled to the knee. A white T.
Her toes cross slightly and she rests her cheek in her palm, leaning over her paper as she decides what to write.
I glance again and again as I write about her.
Truly, though, this poem writes itself, and I just hold the pen.
My words become my masters as they command me to commit them to paper.
Somehow it seems so obvious, to write without thought, to write what one sees and hears and feels.
It need not be profound, it need be just you and what you want it to be.
It need be poetry, and you need be the poet.
I am a poet. You are a poet. We are all poets inside.
Release the inner poet, and let the poem write itself.
Release the inner poet and write poetry, man!
Let your thoughts and feelings flow from the tip of your pen like a vibrant prima donna, fluid from step to step–pirouette, plié, posé, pas de bourrée.
Let the ink dance across the paper, as the prima donna at center stage–graceful, gorgeous, glorious, grand.
Let your words speak depthless volumes, as the prima donna’s prance–soft, sweet, swift, but strong.
Write what you love, and love what you write. Do not be concerned with what others think of it.
Do not be constrained by rhyme, rhythm, reason.
Make your mind slave to your heart, rather than vice versa.
Sound your barbaric yawp, sound it loud and long.
Shout to the world around you; let yourself be heard before it is too late.
You must seize this day by the coattails, drag it in to you until you have it firmly in your grasp.
Then know it, and write it. Write today with all your heart and soul and being.
Write today, begin today. Then continue on into tonight, tomorrow, two or twenty days from now, two or twenty years.
Continue on to the day you die, and write that day too, that those after you might remember it and all that came before.
And as you pass on, the life that you have written and the life that has written itself will remain in your poetry.
And you will be a poet. We're rascals, scoundrels, villains, and knaves. Drink up, me 'earties, yo ho.
We're devils and black sheep, really bad eggs. Drink up, me 'earties, yo ho.
She frees her foot from its entrapment and drops it to the floor, coupled now with her other.
Black sneakers with white socks. Khaki cargoes rolled to the knee. A white T.
Her toes cross slightly and she rests her cheek in her palm, leaning over her paper as she decides what to write.
I glance again and again as I write about her.
Truly, though, this poem writes itself, and I just hold the pen.
My words become my masters as they command me to commit them to paper.
Somehow it seems so obvious, to write without thought, to write what one sees and hears and feels.
It need not be profound, it need be just you and what you want it to be.
It need be poetry, and you need be the poet.
I am a poet. You are a poet. We are all poets inside.
Release the inner poet, and let the poem write itself.
Release the inner poet and write poetry, man!
Let your thoughts and feelings flow from the tip of your pen like a vibrant prima donna, fluid from step to step–pirouette, plié, posé, pas de bourrée.
Let the ink dance across the paper, as the prima donna at center stage–graceful, gorgeous, glorious, grand.
Let your words speak depthless volumes, as the prima donna’s prance–soft, sweet, swift, but strong.
Write what you love, and love what you write. Do not be concerned with what others think of it.
Do not be constrained by rhyme, rhythm, reason.
Make your mind slave to your heart, rather than vice versa.
Sound your barbaric yawp, sound it loud and long.
Shout to the world around you; let yourself be heard before it is too late.
You must seize this day by the coattails, drag it in to you until you have it firmly in your grasp.
Then know it, and write it. Write today with all your heart and soul and being.
Write today, begin today. Then continue on into tonight, tomorrow, two or twenty days from now, two or twenty years.
Continue on to the day you die, and write that day too, that those after you might remember it and all that came before.
And as you pass on, the life that you have written and the life that has written itself will remain in your poetry.
And you will be a poet. We're rascals, scoundrels, villains, and knaves. Drink up, me 'earties, yo ho.
We're devils and black sheep, really bad eggs. Drink up, me 'earties, yo ho.