“Poetry is dead.”

Dead my ass.

Poetry never died

just the poets

and even back when the genre

was hot

only a handful broke the mold.

In bed reading Prose. and thinking about the famous phrase, whether used bitterly

or

ironically for gain

-Poetry is Dead-

Lying here in bed

reading some damn good

poetry by "unknowns"

lying here minutes from Mexico

the mountains out the window

cold and bright with sun

at their peaks

the sound of the street coming

alive with tourists

thoughts of coffee

of poetry

the new poets

reaching for me

touching me

through a screen

on a phone

bookstores down there still

sold out of Cummings,

Eliot, Plath, Neruda, Frost.

Bukowski's corpse still raking

it in.

The magazines and online

presences of poetry

the new blood I read

on Prose.

The novelists, scribblers, story tellers, bloggers, beginners, professionals, old and salty writers pervasive across genres,

and,

yes,

the poetry:

as alive as it ever was

or more.

new writers

cropping up

with just as much

to say as the heroes

or more.

the mountains

out there

breaking through

the low clouds

reaching through

haze

to touch

new

light.