Words

Words

In a way I admit that’s slightly absurd

I like having my way with a noun and a verb

working with words, a real pleasure I boast

I love rich and vibrant English words most

from a long cultural heritage like silk and satin

European, British, Celtic, and extra smooth Latin.

I work with words of all kinds but better still

have a penchant for words that can roll downhill

by themselves, without excess verbosity

words that express a carefree philosophy

words that deliver acceleration and pace

with alliteration and can rhyme in time and place

words that in metre don’t peter away

even tongue tied words can really hold sway

they may struggle to start, come so slowly at first

they stutter and splutter but then with a burst

they thrust verbally forth at the top of the verse

unparalleled images from sows ear to silk purse

they gush forth and progressively gather speed

blitzing the rules of good grammar indeed

both ritzy and crass they perfect their role

even when out of syntactic control

they brazenly ignore all punctuation

leave the reader to ply their imagination

never seek to capitalise on upper case

a tradition that some feel is a waste of space

at full speed they outstrip any writer’s block

and in many a case are unable to stop

at the end of a sentence they just fall off the page

and its at this final frustrating stage

when I’ve struggled so long the right subject to find

they crash headlong into my poetic mind.

Though for hours prior myself I’ve berated

that’s how my poetry is most often created.