And So End by Beginning Again

People keep trying to do things
To undo the things people did.

The impulse is noble, it seems
To people with such impulses,

To replace the bad with the good,
At least until good goes to bad,

And then it’s time to undo things
In the name of good things again.

If most of the consequences
Turn out to be unintended,

Maybe give up intending them.
But people need ends to begin.

Humble I

There’s a great modesty
To egocentrism.
When a pop lyricist

Or MFA poet
Keeps confined to ego,
That suggests this is all

I know—ego in love,
Ego all out of love,
Ego’s experience,

Ego’s faith and trauma.
Nothing about the world
Without ego in it,

No eagerness to claim
Something hasn’t been said,
Not so much as to try

To say better what has.
You sing, I’m all I know.
You’re humble in this world.