Cafe Rose

No don't try to cover up your smile

I suppose I do go on about

It more often than I know

But poetry

Well poetry is so important

I mean good heavens

People even write poems about it

Such poems have always fascinated me

A poem about poetry

It's the self-reference that's so interesting

Gödelian in nature

Hmm you seem surprised that I should

Mention his name

Sigh it's always the same

People assume that we poets can

Only be well read in literature

Never in anything else

Well I tell you right now that

This is one poet who happens to be

Rather well grounded in mathematics

And science yes even honorable science

It is possible to be scientific and poetic

But so few people know that

Only we poets

Ah now you smile again

I suppose it is a bit conceited

Calling oneself a poet is a bit

Like calling oneself a celebrity

The name really must be given

By some person more qualified to judge

And I know what you're thinking...

When the vast majority of my work

Is such unworthy fluff as love poetry

How can I dare to call myself a poet?

Well I take the Paul McCartney school of thought

What's wrong with silly love songs?

Of course maybe you're right

I don't write them any more

Now I spend my time on deeper and more

Relevant issues

Philosophy and such

Ever since...

Well she left me I'm sure you know

Just as well

Quite beautiful and we had lovely times

I still remember her laugh and the

Way her eyes would sparkle and...

I'm sorry

If I don't ramble on about poetry

I ramble on about her don't I?

Well it's over between us and I've

Quite put her out of my mind

And really it's been good for my poetry

I've been reading Eliot lately

Sure sure he's kind of old hat now

And thank God that that kind of super-intellectual

Masturbation has gone out of style

But you know he had a lot to say

I mean damn

If I could be relevant in six or more languages

I guess I'd know that I'd made it

He only wrote one love song you know

And it's so good without being at all

Full of sloppy emotions like

The ones I used to write

He's just got it

Anyway that's what I've been trying lately

Literary allusions everywhere...

And sonnets

Take sonnets now

I've been reading some modern ones

And the new vogue seems to be breaking the form

They've really got a heavy punch

Behind some of them

When I think of how I used to struggle

To stay in the form

And now I see how you don't need it

I've shown you a few of my old sonnets haven't I?

Mostly love sonnets of course

I used to think sonnets were especially good

For that sort of thing

And I always wrote them about her

Sometimes for her

Did I show you number eleven?

I always liked that one

The description of her tossing her hair and brushing it

By the glow of a single candle

Ah that was such a beautiful image

I had to try to capture it

I suppose I tried to do that a lot

Make the memories I thought were beautiful last forever

It's kind of a way of holding on

You know to feelings

And to her too maybe...

She said she'd keep in touch when she left

But we both knew she wouldn't

Too painful and time does heal all wounds

Just like they say...

She was wearing the softest of her blue dresses

On the last day that we saw each other

And she kissed me goodbye

Just as I knew she would

And that was that

It ended and we went our separate ways

I hardly think about her anymore

It's kind of sad I suppose

But anyway

Forms

It's funny how much I used to like writing in forms

When free verse was really the medium of choice

Nobody was writing forms back then

For instance Cummings

He was all over the page

Even nonsensical sometimes

Or Corso or Ginsberg

And there I was fooling with

Sestinas and terza rimas and sonnets and

Villanelles

I did like villanelles

There was something haunting about them

Did I ever show you that one about the horned moon?

I guess that was about her too

I did so love to dance with her

And on the floor with the strobes

And the colored lights

That's what gave me the idea for that line

About dancing on fog and frost in spite of time

It's something I wanted to do

To dance in spite of time

To hold her forever in a misty world

With no end and kiss her

Until the very stars ceased to move

Just to be in each other's arms

That was love in a villanelle...

But I'm not confined anymore by those forms

Now that I've found out that love poetry

Really isn't poetry

I've been able to capture some really

Worthwhile ideas and observations

Into verse that isn't trapped by structure and rhyme

Who needs villanelles and sonnets?

I mean they died in the Middle Ages for God's sake

I support that for my poetry anyway

It's really a good thing that she left me

Now that my thoughts aren't always concerned with her

And all the things I thought I loved about her

Well I guess my vision's cleared

Good thing she's gone really

Who needs love poetry?

What junk you're so right

What...?

Ah yes I'm sorry

You do have to go don't you?

And I have rather run on about poetry again

You're a good sport to humor me

Just like she used to...

Yes well do take care

Goodbye

Christopher J. Cramer

1982?