i’m constantly collecting
lines.
i’m not sure that’s useful.
perhaps i could become a
poet
of fragments, or find a way
to shoehorn them into
ghazals.
i fill page after page
with these bits and pieces –
journals full of
disconnection
while i try to find some
shape
to form them into a poem.
i must be foolish to believe
in poetry;
that it is so necessary. so
urgent.
i chase down the words
before i forget them,
collect them like
butterflies.
or marbles. or stamps.
sometimes i think it is
enough
to simply gather them
together,
display them in array –
let someone else do all the
work.
it’s tempting.
maybe the poetry is found
in the gaps, the spaces
between
the edges, where the line
breaks, where you and i
dance,
and
the whispering breath.
