I was recently asked
By a fledgling young artist,
‘Is art worth it, Sir Po?
The struggle in creating it, that is…’
This made me think back,
Upon my life to this point,
And analyze
Its various
Ups and downs…
The frenzied highs of inspiration…
The thrill of discovering,
Future history…
The hellish moments of rejection,
And doubt…
The fear of poverty,
And retaliation…
The loneliness of the
Lone-traveler,
And meditator…
The boredom involved
In perfecting epics…
The accessibility of a
Clean-groupie’s pussy…
The wrath which iconoclasts
Are shown by the clasted…
Zarathustra’s hobby of
‘Imprinting your hand on millenia
As on wax’…
Oh! What a sweet analogy,
Maestro Nietzsche!
Since just as with wax,
Millenia react,
Solely to heated attacks…
At moments of passion,
And fired inspiration,
My imprint feels certain,
(If only on the hearts and minds,
Of several very future individuals)…
But at moments of cool regularity,
I can feel defeated,
By contemporary banality…
So in answering my fledgling,
I could only quote Rilke,
From his letter to his fledgling,
(And I paraphrase here as I normally do)
‘You will become a poet,
Only if you must become one.’