Willing to Be Ignored

For that drunkish rush of the words
When the pipes are fully opened,
And the ropes of lines whip around
Like snapped cables scattering sparks,

Like the end of any one line
Could kill you if it could touch you,
Like Whitman was uncoiling it,
And Dickinson was wording it,

And something vastly more ancient
Than countable generations
Was generating its power
That sang—This is what verses were,

You gentle idiot, meaning
Way back, before chants praising kings
Or gods or potions like soma—
Before all the storytelling

About anthropomorphic night
And day mating to make the world,
Before anything but the shock
That the lungs could be made bellows,

And the upper appendages
Could semaphore with the singing,
And together the body’s parts
Could create something called meaning,

Although the meaning was the least
Of the poem back then—beginning
To make an appearance, fermenting
The origin of the lightning

That would one day drive whole systems
You might call civilizations,
But still just sprays of lethal sparks
Firing from the tips of your cries—

All you have to do is begin
Hemorrhaging what comes to mind
In the way of whatever form
Of language you’re comfortable in,

Then keep going until you can’t
Continue thrashing anymore.
The experience can be yours,
If you’re willing to be ignored.