January Poems #8: Stand

This is one of those poems that means something differnt to me every time I read it. Sometimes, it's a plea for more plain speaking in poetry. Sometimes, it's a rallying cry for when I lack backbone in any endeavor. Sometimes, it's a reproach for not being more bold. Sometimes, it means nothing at all.

Let's not have any
talk about blood or
hearts here today.

No. Too frequent to
invent a hiatus that
causes real calm, that

looks out for quiet
corners to whole in.
Yes. Comfort is more

required, more welcome
than the urge to
cup it all and feast

long and hard on
something choked with
mama. But I digress.

Movement with the spark
of nerve would be more
fine and dandy than the list

of absolute beauties:
Pens that always run
out in the middle of

the word you wanted to
start with; lips in a
Virginia Madsen Curve;

knowing tweed never dies.
No. What is not too
tight in me is here,

unpoemed mechanism,
wet sails spread over
bodies dear for all to

examine and nod at. But
life props me up again,
peachy ass in the air,

cuffing me past worlds
of flattened-out life that
I call my own creation.