Poetry of Issue #7        Page 8

Who’m I If Not Me?

If I write yours, then I am you.
If you write mine, then I am two.
That’s surely not what we should do
for I’m sure I’d obscure the view
intended. You might be offended
and your readers seek amended
poetry from you, not me,
that’s written how it’s s’posed to be;
but otherhanded, should you choose
attempts to write while in my shoes,
our readers all are sure to lose
their confidence and doubt your views,
and some might even write reviews
quite raving (although not good news),
the paving of a downhill road
in hopes, perhaps, that they might goad
good sense upon our backs, the load
enabling our return, by measure,
to that richer, fuller treasure
when you’ve writ what you should write
and my words come from my insight.

“Vive la différence!” wise Greeks say
(when speaking French) for we know they,
like Germans, Turks, Italians, too,
learn languages in their purview
where borders tangle one-another,
severing each one from the other,
though their accents might lead you
to hear the meanings with a view
that makes some phrases sound askew—
so sometimes should we not eschew
the use of foreign phrases, fraught
with accidental accents caught
upon our tongues and feeble ears
which bring us pained or laugh-filled tears
across the years as we read verses
(most fulfill us—some need hearses)
that growing hordes of would-be bards
have tossed about; some great with shards
which cut to quick twixt meat and bone,
but others, better left alone
which should be ashed or cemeteried,
words which better had not married
thoughts to pen then ink to paper,
lacking even dullest rapier, unfit
to fulfill their caper, out of wit
and not a bit of beauty or of soulfulness …
But clearly, you see, I digress;
these aren’t the words which you’d confess
and write, unless, of course, you’re me—
then I’d ask you,
“Who might I be?”