Criticism

A Poem

Criticism

Let us talk, you and I,
Just here for awhile,
We’ll quiet down the sighs,
And perchance catch a smile.
Chat of figures and of forms,
Wander the expanse of signs,
Bend a word and coin a term,
And scan a couple lines.
It’s all about the time we’ve got,
The lack of hours to scour a poem,
The gain of treasures truly sought,
The urge we ought be getting home.
We ask if beauty really saves,
If beauty’s in the things we make,
And why aesthetics fall depraved
If art is made for art’s own sake.
We might wonder what’s the point,
In pointing out the odds and ends
Of words and poems with words adroit,
If in the end we can’t confess our sins.
But still I like our little chats and raps,
I like the form and figures we thought so clever,
I like the thoughts we think about the facts,
But the fact is—you can’t talk forever.

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