"Personal Website" (a poem by "pen name")

Personal Website

(pen name)

The fire in their hearts went out;

as I read about Ancient Greeks

and an extinct Regime

And crowds in Libya cheer

when I gave up beer.

I saw me and the whole world changing

and I wanted to relight a fire

lonely on the island of Lesbos

And recalled my love of Catulus

with his constantly changing moods

and his love of someone he could never accept

And W.H. Auden

whose lovers were not ever meet in intelligence or age

Whole pantheons of Gods

big and small

And I was so happy

to get an email

from Levi

because it ain't history unless it is written

Sending forlorn love letters,

in fountain pen ink

wondering how the paper will age

and I think of a neighborhood

in Denver

my fifth home

I don't know Thomas Wolfe

I just keep traveling

a character from a John Barth

novel

I want to think I am rogue

and I bet I'd love reading a book about myself

the numerous suicide attempts

substance abuse

hard traveling

with a pocket full of classics

and I'm drinking a Mexican Coke

eating a taco somewhere

and all these roads all leading to some town in Germany

my grandfather visited

all those shrines for heroes of wars

and I smell my mothers cooking

what does separate poetry from prose

thinking I shouldn't send a letter

but what harm could come from a letter-

it sounds so romantic

Lord Byron

with ever changing moods

and I read the buses of my mind

from my own Spandau Prison

but I'm not going to die young

I decided

Will someone please send some Nivea

I can't get it from the commissary

talk about jail time

little fat

but still able to go for long walks, do pull ups

the mystery of my own body

with so many broken bones

and that pea jacket

mad mad mad

St. Stephen

thanks for giving me a song I can sing...

("Personal Website" originally appeared on Literary Kicks' Action Poetry page, February 22, 2011.)