53/365

looking back it seems
that i mostly learned
how to be a man
by having kittens
as a boy.

something about the need
to coax the attention
felt more earned—
than say,
the desperate gushing
of an eager puppy.

such mercurial
sacks of guts and bones.
the damp noses,
the risible rate
of their minuscule hearts,
the narcotic vibrations
of their soporific purr,
the inexhaustible eyes:

intrepid
audacious
lion-hearted

looking back it seems
that i mostly learned
how to be a man
by having kittens
as a boy.

31/365

the problem is—
it’s much harder
than just letting it drip out
like this.

sure the little snapshots,
diary entries
and clever quips
feel good and are easy

but surely these are not poems.

where is the revision,
the intensity,
the literary devises?
not to say anything about
beauty
or fucking meaning.

these drab little
puddles are barely
more than jokes,
observations,
social media posts.

call me
when you’ve found
depth:
start with the poem about
the barber shop
or the power of
kittens and their connection
to gentle masculinity

or the mechanical march
of the magical mundane.

call me
when you’ve found
anything
better than this.

10/365

It said in a book
I’m reading that writing poetry is brave,
not like the fighting kind,
but the kind that looks
at a horrible situation
and doesn’t crumble.

Making anything
the authors says
assumes there’s a world worth making it for.

He guesses
that making anything
is a hopeful thing to do,
and being hopeful
in a world
of pain
is either crazy or brave.   

I don’t know anything about all that.
I just copied his words from the book
to impress you.

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—

Copied that too.
Those words have been on constant repeat
in my head
for years-

Always been too lazy to worry about meaning;—

It rained again all day
and the kitten likes to sit by me
as I read,
watch football,
or doomscroll.

I can feel her perfect tiny heart,
rapidly beating in her chest
like a hectic metronome,
two measures behind
a long rest.