The Poem Is Not, As Someone Put

I Think What Gets A Poem Going Is An Initiating Line. Sometimes A First Line Will Occur, And It Goes Nowhere; But Other Times - And This, I Think, Is A Sense You Develop - I Can Tell That The Line Wants To Continue. If It Does, I Can Feel A Sense Of Momentum - The Poem Finds A Reason For Continuing.

I Was An Only Child, A Very Late Child, Born To Parents Who Were Both 39 At The Time, Which Was Very Late Back Then. That Kind Of Confirmed My Sense Of Being The Center Of The Universe, Which I Guess Every Child Feels - Children And Poets Both Tend To Feel.

By Clarity I Don't Mean That We're Always In Kind Of A Simple Area Where Everything Is Clear And Comforting And Understood. Clarity Is Certainly A Way Toward Disorientation Because If You Don't Start Out - If The Reader Isn't Grounded, If The Reader Is Disoriented In The Beginning Of The Poem, Then The Reader Can't Be Led Astray Or Disoriented Later.

There Are Just Long Gaps Where I Can't Find A Point Of Insertion, I Can't Find A Good Opening Line, I Can't Find A Mood That I Want To Write Into. But Once I Do, Once A Line Falls Out Of The Air, Or I Get A Little Inkling Of A Subject And I Recognize That, It's Like The Sense That A Game Has Started.

This Is Not What It Is Like To Be You, I Realized As A Few Of Your Magnificent Clouds Flew Over The Rooftop. It Is Just Me Thinking About Being You. And Before I Headed Back Down The Hill, I Walked In A Circle Around Your House, Making An Invisible Line Which You Would Have To Cross Before Dark.