how poems are made

by variousignatures

a lack of divinity in the 
eternally dumb iconography
chalice of liquid poetry 
projected onto an HD screen
in Times Square
that repeats our poems 
must verbosely reflect
the ancient pain/beauty
of existence
that repeats our poems
must come from on high
like the intuition of mothers
says Juan Rulfo
from his crypt
that repeats our poems 
backwards to us 
to express their helplessness
the vulnerability of 
words on pages
and how after a while
they stop looking like anything
but a jumbled mess of lines
that repeats in its
crisp electronic yelp
that our voices
are no more real
especially when we 
bring them together
they become tactless
and elusive
without a center
or origin
and I’m back at my 
little desk
looking at a distant picture
of two of my dearest friends
and I’m staring through it
remembering the moment and
it’s the antithesis of poetry
it’s all consuming
beyond creation. 
One’s got a necklace
of trinkets
that represent disassociation
trinkets dispelling hope
for journeys distant 
a lack of egress
shining a light 
blinding 
not pure. 
One’s got a necklace 
a bullet on a string 
and the joke being 
the unknown future recipient’s
name carved into it
that represents freedom
of will
to end off all poetry
an ingress that understands
only brevity
will save our souls
it probably had 
‘art’ or ‘Bill Clinton’
written on it
in nail polish
but we were all convinced 
it would save our 
desperate souls
the neon-chalice repeats
that nothing saves 
the bastard youth
the first memories,
of you 
you must ride it out
and by equation
be lessened 
exponentially 
eternally, 
that no bullet 
frees the poet 
from poetry.

-v.t.s.