Prose

Prose, he screams
Prose
It’s all prose
Maddening straighforward
dog after cat after mouse after crumbs
Love after lust after like after glance
Sitck a condor in there, he rages
Wrinkle the cloth of living
so it mountains and valleys its meaning
Dam up the slow erosion of simple streams
then let it loose in torrents
I want to be excited
I want no story in the way of direct apprehension
of how it feels and means to be RIGHT THERE NOW
and that condor better make me want to soar

Prose, I tell him
Prose
Is what we have now
There’s a music in this madness someone ought to play
I like a condor as much as the next guy
But there’s nothing soaring here as far as I can see
I want our easy rivers to cut as they desire
And the land here’s flat and it needs a story to rise
I want to be excited but I don’t need to try for that
These people speak in storms if you listen
And right here, right now feels like a chest cold
Stops the breathing and strangles the throat
If I choose a poetry made from our workaday wheezing
If I choose a poetry that smells like discount soap
If I choose a poetry that wants a paycheck and not a treasure chest
I think I’m closer to the condor’s flight than you
Because the condor doesn’t soar just to make you swell with art
That bird’s looking for food
And I imagine he’s too hungry to care
if you want him for a metaphor just now