Positive Incapability

In one of those sorrowful,

Doomed efforts to wrest language

From the general public

And make it do some damned good

For a change, there was a pass

At identification

Of persons called disabled

As the handicapable.

It was sweet. It was foolish,

Embarrassing, and futile.

Extraordinary bodies

Landed closer to the mark,

But even that disappeared,

And it’s not only bodies

Or the minds of the people

Inhabiting them. Language

Itself seems to lack the means

To put a positive spin

On incapability.

I cannot tell a lie—that’s

As positive as can’t gets.

The reverse is something else.

Even a poet can coin

A concept as negative

Capability. It’s not

That hard to rest in

Uncertainties, Mysteries,

Doubts. It’s glamorous, in fact.

But none admire the persons

Prone to endless recursion,

Irritably reaching out

To clutch at fact and reason,

The persons positively

Incapable of something

Ordinary for others,

Sublimely so, fine demons.