This is this post's Second Title

I write a poem every December. It's not a conscious thing, or it hadn't been up till now-- I'd given up on poetry while at the University of Arkansas, in the Creative Writing program, upon the advice of one of my instructors that pursuing poetry might deprive my significantly stronger prose talents from due attention. I wasn't going to make it as a poet, in other words. Not that I'm claiming any fortune from any other sort of writing...

Any rate, I tend to get random bursts of poetic inspiration here and there, but it seems that I only ever write any worth repeating, or even completing, in the month of December. So, having not written poetry in over 2 years, I wrote a bit of verse of near epic proportions (by my own standards) in December of '05 about my travelling companions with Topdeck Tours, mostly Australian, whom I travelled most of western Europe with in the course of 3 weeks. I repeated the feat to a lesser degree in December of '06 after skipping around the Republic of Ireland for a week with a different busload of Aussies, and I think I posted this one last year. Imagine my surprise then when I felt an undeniable urge for verse about 6 weeks ago. I should've posted this then, when it was still fresh, but...well...didn't. I'm like that, unfortunately.

*as yet untitled* (because everything I come up with sounds pretentious)

There's a closet where I like to sit
a place of calm and spectral visits.
Once inside, on one to three I wait,
depending on the opening of the gate.
David Bowie's always the first,
and looking 30 years younger, none-the-worst--
Robert Deniro stretches in relaxation;
They're surprisingly jovial in our visitations.
But lastly, thirdly, sometimes, a small jock
whose brushed up talent and bedeckled smock
enable entirely all my mingled sensations.

We talk of geography, travel, effects of beer--
whether that's the new cinnamon candle I hear,
(at which, frowning, the young boy's doubts are said-
he whose war stories hang forever overhead).
Avoiding the storm, the litte black dour dowager
weaves past thistles and into the shower.
I stand, satisfied, from our far-flung debate,
and pass my own way out of the gate.
But there they three stay until I return
and we resume the object that has been adjourned
to gladly unsling any unwanted weight.

******

If you're looking for sense, you'll probably come up dry. Katie knows what I'm writing about, and my cousin Cody might, by accident, without realising it...

Y'all have a great day.
-and rememember-
Life is enjoyed most when you're laughing. Laugh hard, laugh often, and think of me.

PS- I never claimed to be a GOOD poet...