I can’t babysit them like I used to;
there’s no time to set them down gently.
When I get interrupted, as I often do,
my poems don’t queue neatly
like patrons at the post office.
Rather, they are a raucous crowd:
unruly soccer fans, kicking,
clawing, screaming at one another,
clamoring for my attention,
desperate to be noticed.
I hear them strangling now,
words congealing on the page,
stagnant as a blood clot.
Scabbing over, they will harden.
The leftovers wait to be picked off,
wait, impatiently, for their reprieve.
Photo credit: John Martinez Pavliga, via flickr // CC BY 2.0
(I realize this is a crowd of football fans, not soccer fans, but they certainly look raucous to me!)
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