The Ideal Problem

her words fell on the paper
like racoon garbage driven out onto the streets
separate now from its insecure
and overflown receptacle

there’s a kind of freedom there
in the fetid way that a spoiled rag
festers on top of a bitumen strip
folded in on itself like a dead origami rose,
sat with satin stains of beige and cherry swirls,
no longer conscribed to the over-arching narrative
no longer eligible for reprieve
free: to be taken;
out of context

free to be; a reminder
that somebody needs to clean up
this mess

in any utopia, there is
a farm hand who would rather be a dreadnought
a prison guard who enjoys the night shift
a grave digger who works weekends

tell me
do you know when enough is a lot?
do you know how a bleeding heart clots?

see, the sad truth is
every writer needs an editor
someone who can scrub cat piss
out of a blanket statement
someone who knows better
than to say what
they mean

a poem is an olive
that must be soaked in a bath of lye
to be cured from the natural
taste of its creator


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