3.2.2026

THIS POEM

Photo: Julienne Alviar

Presents itself for your consideration.
Freely admits to scanning other poems

with envy. Has stood before honest mirrors
and failed to slash its pathetic fallacies

but eyes its own wrists with sinister intent.
Having wept and fasted, having wept and prayed

in its servile aping of the Modernists,
has presumed to crash the poetic banquet,

only to be bounced, teary and ravenous.
Chairlifted to the summit of Parnassus,

has had to schuss down on its scrawny backside,
clutching a ski in each of its sad mittens.

Dear reader, if you’re still reading, you’ve allowed
this poem to waste your time. What have you done.

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NOTE
Welcome, new subscribers, and thank you. From time to time I will be dipping into the archive and reposting some poems you probably haven’t seen. For readers who remember seeing this poem before (in slightly different form), I hope you enjoyed it then and hope you’ve enjoyed it this time, too.