Ars Poetica Schmoetica

Another day, another carnival—the Tilt-A-Whirl,
             the Zero Gravity, the mechanical bull.
Oh, please, throw me off—you inklings, you—
             send me sideways, sidetracked,
anywhere but stuck, lost in a sea of doldrums—
             those windless waters—nothing
but Save Our Ship and all that jazz—poet gone
             overboard. Give me a break!

I’m talking aloud here, talking a workout
             from hell—the treadmill, of course,
first used as prison punishment, and now,
             gates popping up all over—your tollgates,
your mitigates, your floodgates. So why not
             give me an ooh, give me an ah,
give me that old-time psithurism—the music
             of rustling leaves—a walk in the park.

And while we’re at it, I’ll take a kick to the can,
             to the canter, the candor. I mean
what’s the point of playing hard to get,
             of here we go ’round the omniana—
those scraps of notes I’ve jotted down all my life,
             it seems, only to misplace them?
Oh fogdog—what is it about your bright spot—
             sudden breakthrough in the haze,

about holy smoke setting off alarms, lighting up
             the whole enchilada, kaboodle, shebang?
Oh my bad mish-mashed mashups—bafflegab
             meets ballyhoo meets shimmy, shimmy
ko-ko-bop—the rock, indeed, around the clock—
             my do-si-do-ing somehow going
from falter to balter—to stubbornly dance
             the shuffle, the time warp, the twist.