Versatility, It Is The Key

Versatility, it is the key to poets writing verse;
there can be no simple substitute to finding
words – no easy games to play that tease a
verb, raise a pregnant noun, find rhythms
bound in rhyme to lift a page. To write is work,
I say it with a chaliced grin; my daily grind is
done before the dawn begins to smile its
welcoming at break of day. Rhythms wake me
in a way which chases sleep, rhymes complete
an earnest call to write; I have a line impressed
when I arise which leads to greater things and
write it down. And then I am at ease and rest.

That I play with words
it is not an idle boast
or refrigerated arrogance;
somewhere inside
odd connections are made
and previously disparate entities
form glowing relationships.

My part in it is the least understood.

I merely write them down
to read. And reading is the
key which, occasionally,
makes it poetry.

They are not fields filled
with free-ranging ideas,
they are flat plains with
no hills and barrenness
as consummate as an
empty conscience. The
morality of me comes
from living in the fringe
of your reality – you will
never care less while I
grieve wilfully for us all.
© 5 January 2008, I. D. Carswell