“Poetry seems to perform hypnosis, the found rhymes and assonance and anaphora enacting an enchantment, a bewitchery; it seems to be giving subconscious advice. Get ready! You must change your life.”

Elisa Gabbert is the author of five collections of poetry, essays and criticism, most recently “The Unreality of Memory & Other Essays.”

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Tue Jan 2024, 2023 8:33am

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Or it may not,
but know, core know, say it out loud,
write down by hand in pen,
this poetry thing
is addicting
and dangerous

Sadly,
I am an addict,
Not a recovering one,
for the infection
has no cure,
no vaccine,
and amputation
does not help

Sometimes, for a time,
it goes deep,
it is living while you believing,
and disbelieving
sometimes, for a time,
it got bored and travelled on

Not how it works

almost every sub surfaces,
the innocuous are not innocent,
a quick retort, an unfocused hazed memory
trips you up
and down on the sidewalk
a familiplace,
you return/go

and back on Boogie Street,
no need to find a dealer,
they find you
and the new curse word of modern times,
“use your words!”
fates but does not sate,
and you think to yourself,
the quieter time was fine,
but this pleasuring release,
the bewilderment
the urging and the purging
of poem after poem after poem
is the hell you love.