My writing doesn’t have to
awe you, bring you to your knees,
no lightning strikes, no awards—
Guggenheim, Pulitzer—no dozen
or more men falling in love with me.
My writing doesn’t have to
spin me, make me feel exalted,
accepted, a member of something
with a weird name, doesn’t have to jump
from the page to run a literary
marathon, doesn’t have to echo
or need to be my favorite or your
favorite, doesn’t have to bring
tears or enlightenment, join a pantheon,
explain life, death, injustice.
My writing just has to be
whatever it is: shard
or whale, ukulele
or harp. Semantic still life,
indulgent gaze at my own wrinkled navel.
I watch the page slowly fill
with this scrawl—the humpbacked,
wobbly words still (always) learning to walk.
My writing: pretty today,
feeding the worms tomorrow.
