Telegram for Mrs. Smith

This poem takes a somewhat contrary view of what poetry is and is not.

Telegram for Mrs. Smith

 

Poetry’s not therapy or a person you

can talk to for comfort or relief. Not

one single poem has answered a question--

not among the Greeks, or even in Shakespeare.

 

Poetry can be a bird--or even

a tree at times--but only when the bird

is wounded or dead and the tree is on

fire in your grandfather’s pasture. Poetry’s

 

not the solution to poverty or war--

not the sort of letter that you write

to the editor of the Tribune, or

send in an email to a congressman.

 

But poetry is sometimes a meal--

a thin crust of bread or a Lobster Flambé

�"a hot piece of shrapnel--a bullet

on the doorstep to the back of your brain.

 

© Mark MacDonald  2013