I
ask them to take a poem
and
hold it up to the light
like
a color slide
or
press an ear against its hive.
I
say drop a mouse into a poem
and
watch him probe his way out,
or
walk inside the poem's room
and
feel the walls for a light switch.
I
want them to waterski
across
the surface of a poem
waving
at the author's name on the shore.
But
all they want to do
is
tie the poem to a chair with rope
and
torture a confession out of it.
They
begin beating it with a hose
to
find out what it really means.
