Is It True?

Is it true that poetry can’t be written
when happy, when laughter intrudes,
forces its boisterous echoes
through the cracks in the door?

Poets long for pain, for the place of
comfort and stability in instability,
the processed taste of instant
macaroni-and-cheese

There is need to revel in the degradation
of soul, prod, semi-vicious and
impatient at the wounds

What’s so interesting about joy—
with its ring around the daisies,
pockets full of posies
knick-knack niceties

Pain is a vitamin, essential
in “plumbing the depths of despair,”
endless in loosening melancholy,
desperation, heart titillations

Happiness lies only in gingham cheeriness,
yesterday's maypole banters,
ribboned mementos, paling in the shadow


Written: 6/1/06