a poem for the ages

[mikey451]

i've been walking
this endless loop of a sidewalk
for a long
long
time, now....

walking, as barefoot as a poet in the wilderness,
as barefoot as a philosopher
in his private library,
carefully smoking from an oversized pipe.

puff, puff, and i arch my back downward
to see more clearly the thing between my feet
for i am an intellectual,
and this is what i do.

it is a potato bug, and i look at it for,
i dunno,
maybe five minutes.
or something.

not because i find it interesting,
but because it seemed like the thing to do.
because it seemed so poetic and free thinking,
because it was so unorthodox and beautful.
because i go to evergreen.

like so much of poetry, this act was about denial.
both the untruth of writing it
and the dishonesty of reading it:
our mutual and determined failure to realize
that the poet is not in the wilderness,
staring at a bug or something,
but at a computer
in the library,
writing this down.

someone is reading over his shoulder,
wishing he would finish his stupid poem
so she can write her damn term paper.

his true feeling is not
zen clarity;
it is, in fact,
annoyance.

his poem is worse than a lie.