Keep It To Myself

What if God gave me the sky
and let me write upon it
in letters two clouds high
so a line of poetry stretched
halfway across the state?
Yes, that’s when I’d learn
I’ve nothing much to say.

But, wait! What about the engine room?
That growth! That door somewhere in my skin
to the steaming, grimy, ta-pocketa space
that grew to power my place in this world,
unnerved bosses and made contractors do
exactly what I said and for how much,
made women take inventory for the man
they’d someday hope to get, kept
mechanics and car dealers fairly honest,
fixed broken things in single Saturdays,
paid all the bills even in the broke years,
so a wife and kids could believe me
when I said, “It’s going to be alright.”

I’m going to waste the sky for that?

Let's save the sky for all
its hellos and goodbyes.