Absinth

Can I just come out and say right now that I absolutely despise poetry?  Reading it—much less writing it!—is the epitome of monotony.  It feels archaic and senseless.  More often than not I feel like halfway-decent prose could describe anything much better than a poem could.

I suppose the reason I write poetry, then, is to perhaps understand it.  It’s been around longer than I care to think, in countless forms and languages.  Or maybe I’m just a closet masochist.

Absinth

Sitting in a lone reverie,
dreaming of solace and silent relief,
I tune out the white static inside my mind
and to this reverie I am confined.

But I am haunted by a phantom most vain—
self-indulgent, humanity’s bane,
narcissistic, overbearing,
malignant, plastic, cold, uncaring.

Nature prescribes in its ethereal way:
“Indulge in elixir and forget today
and forget them and forget me
and sleep soundly, pleasantly.”