Words I'm Writing: A Poem (April 1, 2014)

I generally don't like reading poetry. Too often it's cryptic. Too often it's self-indulgent--little more than an author's in-joke--deliberately obfuscatory, or simply obscure, but that doesn't keep me from once in a while perpetrating the same.

Pearl

A pearl

Is what an oyster conjures—

A sheath of smooth, bright nacre

Over sand that wounds

But what oyster

On what wave-lashed rock

Is ever asked to form a pearl

Not over jagged sand

But to fend against

What is keenly longed for—not once in a lifetime but twice—

To shut away the selfsame haunting grain? 

I began this more than five years ago. I came across it today by chance and changed a few words that finally made it seem finished. Virtually no one will understand it, but I imagine poems are somewhat easier to decipher than visual art, which I fairly regularly create while feeling no need to explain. So, here is a poem: Make of it what you will.