the poet as truth teller

[revolutionR]

I always was seeking to know truth
but when you see that truth
at an early age, and you know that for
the rest of your life, you will be looking
for a way to be able to speak to it
the truth is about what is really going on
to be able to speak to the truth
you have to find a voice

thus begins the journey of the poet
when I say poet I use that word as a path
there are all kinds of poets, as it should be
as I see it poetry is and always has been
deep down a mirror to our world
where as the poet is a kind of holder of that
mirror, which is a practice, there is no right
or wrong way to do that, except that you
learn to hold it even when the reflections
are like a flood of possible ways to say
what others can not or will not

what this means is that some poets may
skirt things by sticking to a certain method
but the days of being able to skirt are running out
poetry is not static, and even though roses are red
and that will work, poetry itself as I see it
is a living entity, she is the flower of language
she is looking for the unexpected, the unusual
is how she reveals herself

that does not mean she has to be a sideshow freak
a two headed snake in a jar
poetry is not Hollywood, ask Bukowski
but poetry is like a drunk Santa Claus walking down a
road pointed toward the north pole
poetry is not the collective conscience, it is the lone
voice talking to the myriads of stars hung in the night
to that one star that will hear my plea
in some lost hope that she will be listening

[judih]

zeroing in on it
poetry is a verb

[revolutionR]

Zero to zero
in the middle of that is everything else
we come in at zero and go out as zero
infinity to infinity
a one does not look like a zero
a two does not look like a three
and so on until it all goes back to a round nothing

poetry
a p does not look like an o and o dos not look like
an e an e does not look like a t a t does not look
like an r and r does not look like a y

somehow it all adds up to poetry