Thank you, Patricia Lockwood.

You are the praying mantis that

ripped off my head.

You reached out with long limbs and played Twister in my brain.

At 51 I didn’t know poetry could

bend me backward and

make me like it.

 

Has anyone called you their muse before?

 

I thought that I wanted to be a muse.

I thought that I wanted to be Layla, who was also got Something.

But since you happened

I realized

epiphanized

that I’d rather be Clapton or Harrison because, frankly, anyone can wear white go-go boots.

 

Before this morning*

I never thought of poetry.

 

I didn’t say that I don’t like poetry.

I said I didn’t write poetry

because its’ mojo is a special sauce, and no one really knows the recipe since some like it 

spicier than others.

And you, Patricia Lockwood, are a ghost pepper.

.

I’ve always wondered about poets.

How do they get in there?

How do they get into

those deep belly holes

and pull out all of that lint and sticky and smell?

I sniff it, roll it around on my thumb for a moment

then flick it away.

But poets, they don’t flick

they go beyond sniff and roll

they marvel at it, stare into the tight little lint ball

like a Wiccan peering into a polished crystal

 

Crap.

This is why I’m not a poet.

 

Real poets, like you, don’t make effortless, mundane metaphors disguised as something clever.

Real poets make metaphors that

kick and

punch and

rip off your clothes.

 

How your words feel in my

mouth

how they shook my

head

was so confusing. 
I got to the end and wasn’t sure I liked it,

the thrill of you made me a little sick. 

But here I am, back in line, ready to do it again. 

 

What a glory it must be to make someone puke with words.  

 

Thank you, Patricia Lockwood.

For rubbing me raw  

I’m 51 years old and before this morning

I never thought of poetry

before the sun burned off all the wet

and I was still damp from what you did to me.

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*Monday, May 21, 2018, at 4:10 a.m. after reading Patricia Lockwood’s Tin House article How Do We Write Now