From my self published book The Unapoet
which sold about a dozen copies, I guess
The Poem at the end of the Book
To the character of the Pig Woman
in George Ainslie’s play
What I did Last Summer
I’m not a Terrorist, I’m a Poet
But a good Poet should be both.
Knives of words,
images that splash and splatter,
yet dream and hope.
Poetry should be theatre and threaten
scream, strangle and stab hypocrisies
blooden and blow up pomposities
kill denial, wound refusals,
(the germans who didn’t know, didn’t know
the bosnians, muslims and serbs who also never knew
the americans who never knew
that the returned slave might be tortured
as might the returned Haitian
and you always believe a Policeman’s word
over a civilian)
Poetry should hold emotions hostage,
demand the release of falsely imprisoned desires,
and issue man and women festoes
on the rights of everyone
to be who they are
who they would be.
Poets need not be identified
nor does the poem need a name, a face,
a face should not be photographed
either for text books
or United States Post Office walls.
No photos’ No photos’
only poor fading drawings
sketched in the back seat
at eighty miles an hour
upon leaving the site
where something has really really happened
this time
this once and final time.
Give not a name to the Poetry
to the Poet
no name no name’
Leave that to others
who remember it
as the smell of fire
the odor of burning
the perfume of change
this poet must oppose
those who think they own power
and the lands and the lives of others
and the minds of others
the poet should always be suspect
the poems must always be rejected
the language must be inspected,
seeking these dreams of fire and flowers
Poets must be prepared
to have their heads hoisted
on petards at the gates of
Fritz Lang’s Metropolistic City
as the last warning to be sent
to other Poets
to return to writing villanelles
on romance
and hiakus on nature.
Poets should always comb their hair
prior to the Reading.
Bob Small 11-17-95
original written on 11-04-95, while
listening to Donna Jo Napoli