Organic or Inorganic
I wrote a poem about a
Poem I read about a guy
Who became a horse,
And wouldn’t you know it
Two days later, I read a
Poem that made that poet
Look like a piker and the
Poem a grade school primer
On metaphors and similes.
This poet, in the span of
Twenty-one short and
Some really short lines,
Became about fifteen
Different things such as
(As, like like constitutes
A simile and therefore I,
As, or like a poet, am
Using a simile in my poem.)
The leaves of an oak,
A feather of a heron
By a pond, and then a
A root artery and a face
Like a star. The poet’s
Happiness was dizzying
And I was just getting
Dizzy. In the second
Half of the poem, she
Was many things includ-
Ing the tip of a wave
And she ends by writ-
Ing that she is the cloud
With legs that looks like
A lamb. And here I am,
Still after all these years
Trying to correctly answer
The Twenty Questions as
To Whether I’m animal,
Vegetable or mineral, when
Given what I eat, I’m
All three, so instead
Of becoming all that
Stuff about which I’ve
Been reading, I’m becom-
Ing the food I eat and
Vice versa and it doesn’t
Take a metaphor to explain
That, so now the question is
Whether I’m organic or
Inorganic most of the
Time. (Please don’t ask
My friends.) But perhaps
I should reconsider whether
We become what we
Read. Because, if so, I’m
Not sure I want to be a
Cloud that looks like a
Lamb. If so, I would
Much rather be a horse,
A sleek and beautiful
Race horse. But to
Answer that one, it
Just might take a
Poet.
bobdahl 