I came to Barnes Noble
to feel like a writer,
believing that my proximity to books
would anoint me
kinda in the way
hugging a good-smelling friend
makes you a part of them
if only for a while.
I'll take that...
smelling like a great wordsmith
If just for the time
I rub against them.
So I sit in the museum of
colorful covers
and barcodes
channeling Billy Collins
or Susan Wheeler
(maybe Dr. Suess)
glowing with empowerment,
while my ostentatious
and somewhat snooty tablet
stands arrogantly atop
this cafe table
in parallel unity
with the Caramel Macchiato,
because poets know
Starbucks is Popeye's spinach
for authors.
Then clumsy fingers
pound out
keyboard percussion
swelling into
a privilege of honor
that God would
love us enough
to give us words,
and people,
who will sustain us
in their admiration,
right or wrong.
Where the meager difference between
walking among giants or peasants
will only be known
after we are long gone.
We write
not so that we are known
in this moment,
but that we will be
criticized by the future.
I pray I am hated more than you all
a thousand years from now.
Mar 7, 2014
Mar 7, 2014 at 12:28 AM UTC
I came to Barnes Noble
to feel like a writer,
believing that my proximity to books
would anoint me
kinda in the way
hugging a good-smelling friend
makes you a part of them
if only for a while.
I'll take that...
smelling like a great wordsmith
If just for the time
I rub against them.
So I sit in the museum of
colorful covers
and barcodes
channeling Billy Collins
or Susan Wheeler
(maybe Dr. Suess)
glowing with empowerment,
while my ostentatious
and somewhat snooty tablet
stands arrogantly atop
this cafe table
in parallel unity
with the Caramel Macchiato,
because poets know
Starbucks is Popeye's spinach
for authors.
Then clumsy fingers
pound out
keyboard percussion
swelling into
a privilege of honor
that God would
love us enough
to give us words,
and people,
who will sustain us
in their admiration,
right or wrong.
Where the meager difference between
walking among giants or peasants
will only be known
after we are long gone.
We write
not so that we are known
in this moment,
but that we will be
criticized by the future.
I pray I am hated more than you all
a thousand years from now.
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