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Love

I hate being a poet…and by hate, I mean love.

And by love, I mean only, that I am compelled,

driven here.

I hate that I can’t write about Israel,

or sunsets and daisies, or in the voice of Sophocles.

I hate that I still write best in the language of a teenager

full of angst−− and by best,

I mean, I’m most satisfied.

I hate that I write poems to you

and that I write poems about writing poems.

That emotions

more than imagery

crowd the page, panting.

That I forget that moods aren’t facts.

I hate the need −− the greed for words. I hate that I tend

to complicate with forced routine.

I hate that I’m readable and relatable and I hate that I just presumed that.

I hate that I’m confessional. I hate that I’m not more academic,

scholarly, referential, clever, or elusive.

I hate that that’s a fact. I hate that I worry

I’m meant to write not poems but rather drivel in a diary

and that I want to

wring the little neck of Philomel.

Most of all, I hate that I sling words like hate and words like love around.

I hate that the evidence is in.