The Love Life of a Poet

Man and poet? Bet you know it Tender verse can get you girls Plain or – whoopee! – eager groupie Matching your poetic pearls Just how much you get to touch, you Can ascertain easily You’re a freshman? Write for trash can? Or a man of fame - like me? Publications! Invitations! It’s a never ending show Celebrations! Admirations! Fans will line up in a row They surround me, flitter ‘round me For the words I’ve put to rhyme They adore me and ‘encore’ me For my sonnets so sublime My reciting is inviting My performances include Joy, devotion, self-promotion And an ode to womanhood As I’m signing, I’m defining Who this night my dear will be Conversation, dedication They’re an open book to me This one swinger, she will linger Help me with the volumes left To my room then, love will bloom when She applies her fingers deft Just imagine how she’s stretching On my long, luxurious bed From that point though, things just won’t go As I planned them well ahead Yes, I crave to, and will slave to Pluck the fruits when time is ripe But there’s something interrupting I’m the more reflective type I stand thinking, she keeps winking Wishing me into her arms But I know I’m not to go, I’m Captured by my muse’s charms She is urging, I am searching Words to frame the scene I see Not her figure is my picture But the form of poetry Pentameter, hexameter? Which will suit my feelings best? She’s lascivious - I’m oblivious Of her want, her heaving chest Should I sense her like a Spenser Honouring his Faerie Queene? Or recall her like E. Waller ‘Lovely roses must be seen’? Should I make clear like a Shakespeare ‘Love looks not with eyes but mind’? Or bring words forth like a Wordsworth ‘Weak our will, our judgement blind’? Observation, contemplation Passion has eternity? Confirmation, cancellation Love will live, but not for me Out of lust she hurries past me Picking up some clothes en route My excuses, they are useless It’s goodbye, for now, for good Oh, I could have and I should have Known that this would come about Not the first time, nor the worst time That my love is running out Plus point of it: there is profit From each unfulfilled affair A collection – quite a section – Of the finest underwear But no gain is where no pain is Fame and fail go hand in hand Greatest glory, saddest story My career’s ambivalent All the lauding and applauding All my virtuosoships It will sway by, can’t outweigh my Hundreds of rejection slips