Poetry by Zack Madden

 

 

Hemoglobin Rose

We all have a Muse.
She may express herself in any of a thousand different ways,
but she’s there.
She’s hidden in the piece of white paper in front of you,
smiling from the depths of the blue-line molecules.
Even if you can’t see her, she can see you.

She’s laughing at you.
She’s laughing because you’re writing a poem about her, and it’s
terrible.
You have to do something to fool her.

Quickly now,
think of a title.
Think of a word that rolls off the tongue;
a catchy word,
a fluid word;
hemoglobin.

Hemoglobin, there’s a remarkable word.

Now she’s listening.
She’s stretching herself out until her face is outlined in the thin
white membrane of the paper.
She’s looking for one more syllable;
hemoglobin, it could almost be the first line of a haiku,
but it needs one more syllable,
a partner.

She’ll help you think of a partner;
rose.

Hemoglobin rose.

She’s draining all the life from your hand; you can’t feel it.
She’s moving in between the little bones in your fingers,
and brilliantly torturing the spaces until you write.

Until you write a haiku.

Hemoglobin rose,
My breath’s sharp intake, my own
poor spirit’s poem.

 

 

self-referential sonnet

There are exactly fifteen words,
twenty-five syllables,
and zero metaphors in the first three lines.

The fourth line is an excuse for the poet to tell his girlfriend I love you.

The fifth line doesn't say anything.

The sixth, seventh, and eighth lines are virtually indistinguishable.

The ninth line uses, in the opinion of the critic, a great deal more words
than are really needed to prove the poet's point, so much so that
it takes up the tenth and eleventh lines too.

But the twelfth line is shorter.
The thirteenth line is well-written,

and the fourteenth line wraps it all up, neatly.