Poems
need be writ-
naked,
stripped of all
costumes and customs
designed to protect them
from lifes inclement elements.
If it’s hot,
let the poem sweat.
Frigid?
It shivers.
If it sings of breasts,
let them be huge, round and soft…
silver-dollar-pancake-nippled
full of mothers milk-
enough to suckle-septuplets…
Yes!
Squeeze them,
of course!
But not into some
Double-D-Cup-Cage!
Let them rest,
Right There!
Grand in all their glory
as their Maker made them!

Too,
this applies to poets:
Jeffers
sits at his desk,
nude,
conjuring Tamar,
as Una,
beside him,
fondles more than just his themes;
Dickinson
never felt it
rude
to toss aside
her bridal-white-dress
to write of “wild nights”.

Damn constraints!
Double-God-Damn
any forced-formulaic-expectations!
For a corset and a bussle
crafted a body
much lauded as “A Beauty”
but was a lie!

And,
forgive this old-man-word-smith,
if you ring my bell,
mid-afternoon
on an unannounced visit
and I fling my door
wide open,
wearing just
silver-chest and gray-belly
hair
and a smiling growl
inviting you to
“Come-in!”
for a “Frosty-Flying-Fuzzy-Navel”
if it’s hot July
(and not to early-afternoon for you…)
or
a hot Chai-Spice-Tea
with two fingers of rum
on a freezing late February day…
(But why the Hell are you out in it, anyway?!)
And
don’t you dare hint
I re-robe myself
to ease your embarassed discomfort.
Just drink up
or
leave me be!