Was It A Poem, Yes!

He asked me if it was a poem;
I said yes, there was no doubt in
my mind. It was a poignant and
singular examination, an emanation
from a common past shared in brutal
streets where we still live. A wasteful
death in tragic circumstances marking
vulnerabilities we all try to hide from
but with no chance of real success.

It reflects his blunt, laconic style of
poetic largesse. He never uses two
words when one would suffice,
bothers less with spell checker or
grammar nanny, artificial devices
have no place in his economically
crafted and no-nonsense creativity.
I admire the man because he makes
it work without apparent effort.

So why does a reader fall short
on charity and challenge a claim
to lyrical credibility? My guess is a
form of poetic dementia, remember
what goes around comes around;
or perhaps, and more pertinently,
a rigid belief that space for comments
at the bottom of the page is an
inalienable right to engage in
open-forum, ‘chat room’ anarchy.
© I.D. Carswell 2006