So what if there are a finite number
Of subjects. The canon weighs us down
With thinking its immutable.
Why should I try to preserve the old dead’s posture to be immortal.
Why do I need to feel sublated by some hidden logic
Which reflects the privileged excellence of what amounts
To an extremely famous diary?
Why do I need to shy away from abstractions
When elite poetry is so anxious of acknowledging
Material class conditions?
It is in my constitution I guess to feel a certain way and want to write about it.
I grew up with those old-timey books with spines from the fifties.
I learned from folks whose works were in the public domain.
You know at those places where librarians were forced to become social workers,
As you gave us increasingly nowhere else to go.
Making it seem like it was our bad for overdosing in the bathroom;
Turning around to find it a money-making form of conflict in your hip short story.
You made that new.
You hunt for your subjects,
Those who have dethroned clichés
But must stake a career on their
Anxiety of influence.
As a cult of genius
Becomes cults of geniuses.
We here at the amateur end
A bane to libraries,
For what songs did we have to contribute.