The way to kill a poem
is to put it on hold…let
minutia drag you off
over, under, anywhere
until you dig in and
stop

dust off and start again, this time
slightly off-center
a little less inspired
you start to connect the dots
when the phone rings
“I’ll let the machine get it,” you decide
but listen anyway

because it might be something important
like Publisher’s Clearing House Sweepstakes Notification Office
or, more importantly
your aunt
and it is, so you pick up and putter
while she tells you her news
and you shelve the poem
for love
because, after all…
a poem
never read you stories
or baked you cookies

So you hang up
shake out the poem, fluff it up lovingly, tenderly
look it in the eye, study it, trace the first line…though…you might have
forgotten something…oh, yes…the kettle’s whistling

because your phone visit went on a bit, but
confident in your ability to brew coffee and a poem at the same time
you grind the beans and pour the water into the filter while
others start padding through
with arms full of laundry
greetings
requests
the opening
of cans
of tuna
so that the cat bursts in
wailing
a sliding siren underfoot
to ensure
it’s remembered
she likes tuna, too
even though
she’s licked every can
opened in this kitchen
since 1999
and so, finally
you admit defeat

the poem
has shriveled up in a tight little wad
like a once-luscious blossom
face turned up at the sun
its petals, once translucent and glowing with glory
it cows and prays
to roll off in the breeze.

Go ahead, you can step on it now

You’ll never get it back, that moment when a thought unfurls and beckons other delectable, delicious words who swoon into it and that moment breaths them into itself, winding, twisting, weaving into something with a life of its own, a startling place of discovery when you didn’t think there was anything left to find of yourself or how you think or wish or hope and it might be perfection or at least it’s euphoric and then the phone rings.

The moment is a god.