the adoring fans were staged
along the ramparts
hurling insults at the critics
who had been laying seige
even before there was
the printed word.

came the assault,
the artillery was poised, loaded,
and fired.  

"Shakespeare was a fake!"
"Stephen Crane wud a turrible writer!"
shot the critics.
again the volley launched
..."John Keats poems were often vague,
languorously narcotic and lacking a clear eye!"
"baudelaire pierced the heart of wordsworth,"
cried the romantics.
ginsberg let out a howl,
thoreau retreated to the woods,
and plath and woolf did not survive.

insults dripped
to the languid ears
of the faithful
and the faithless hordes.

lines upon lines,
prose and poetry,
were formed
and the letters of words
marched on
in spite of us all.

ms/'18