What to Say to Those Who Think

You're a Fool for Choosing Poetry

--Joseph Fasano

       

Tell them yes.

Tell them poetry is what chose you.

Tell them

you had a night, once,

just as they did,

when you knelt alone on the cold tiles

and asked the night

to give you a reason for being.

Tell them the answer was your life.

Tell them we are nothing, nothing

without passion,

the wild dark flock

that fills our rooms with joy.

Tell them

you will give the rest of your blazing days

to try to give another life

that moment,

that moment when you opened

to the coldness

and found that the music of your ruin

was too beautiful to ever be destroyed.