Solitaire

“Man Reading” by Karl Schmidt-Rottluff

 

writing seems such a solitaire game
between you and a deck of words
you deal them out
onto your paper or screen
and look for the hooks
to connect them in sequence
expressing the feelings
you find in your mind

but isn’t a solitaire game
meant for pitiful lonely
the chronically bored
a device to splice
sleep onto staying awake
escape from rude news
all the bray of the day
and parts of life best ignored

yet unlike a solitaire game
that dies on new turn of a card
writing lives for as long
as alacrity strains
to offer those clever-set
phrases and lines
to other eyes lonely and bored
in their solitaire game of reading

 

 

(originally posted March 2013)