When I first give someone a poem I’ve written,

after telling them to dissect it with nit-pick nails

and hard-rimmed stares, I do not ask them,

“So what do you think?”

I ask them, “So what do you taste?”

Because good poetry should taste like

your favorite flavor of ice-cream,

biting cold on the tongue but enough

to make you smile, tinged with memories,

some good, like summertime with

your childhood best friend,

some bad, like the consolation prize

after getting tonsils removed.

Poetry should taste like runny sunsets,

hours dripping into each other on the canvas

of the horizon, the kind of sunset that makes you

count your breaths and cherish each one.

I write poetry because sometimes

ice cream melts, but words don’t.