My eyelids felt so heavy, that I wished again to be

at home, and in my warm bed fast asleep.

I did not wonder what the poet said, for it was not to me.

I’d worked on my Medieval Literature project

too hard last night to have to stay awake right now.

I also didn’t really care to sit up straight and listen

to the articulated words or who they were about, or how.

And so I slept in that hard wooden pew

missing every single word the poet said.

I dreamt of autumn trees with orange leaves

and of wearing warm sweaters while I read

a fascinating novel, or perhaps a poem.

I was awakened then to run after a group

of people who did not wish to wait for us, and left.

I followed, half asleep, and had to stoop

to tie my shoe which came undone in haste.

I was already quite awake at the next reading

and wondered as I listened to the poets speak:

why are they here, a part of this huge meeting?

I did not understand, but also didn’t know

what it was, for sure, that I misunderstood.

“I am a poet,” she declared from the stage

and read a cloying, wordy poem where she stood.

There was a section that I liked, and maybe

some advice she gave was beneficial.

But there was something in it all that I disliked;

something in the way she spoke seemed superficial.

“As a poet I can say…”, “from my experience I’ll tell you”.

Who is a poet? Do I know?

And if these people, are really such in their profession,

why do they make it such a show?

And if each one chose the profession of a “Poet”

why do they speak in long, misleading phrases,

with convoluted meanings that simply do not show it?

I do not think that these here are true poets.

I think that standing on a stage

with loudspeakers, lights, and listeners

does not form from a man of any age

one who can turn the world into true art,

or into horror: depending on his or her perspective;

or a complicated creature of the world

who can combine any two words selected

into a beautiful and rhythmic rhyme.

A Poet is not made by audience and speeches,

the way the royal suite brings their King his fame.

A poet makes himself, and all he teaches

is how to see the world through his own eyes.