Poetry

A poem is not a poem

Just because you break

sentences into run-off

lines

It is not because you use words
As sharp and swords
To show that you can rhyme
All the time

It is not a poem because you employ
Gargantuan phrases of flabbergasting opacity
It is not a poem because your metaphors are like butter to bread
It is not a poem because your imagery is like a waterfall cascading down a beautiful forest

It is a poem because the meaning you carry inside of you is deep and multilevelled, and precious, too precious to be made bare to those who make no effort to understand. It is a poem because ordinary language might insult the complexity and beauty of the thoughts you want to reveal.

So by all means, write your poems, thrill us all.
But don’t you force anything down our throats

After all,
We are not goats