30 Poems in 30 Days - #12 Poets

Of all the venues in all the cities in all the world...you've walked in here.
First timers and audience vets, you are here today as equals
And while you differ in what drew you in
Some - a wary curiosity
Some - a staggering addiction
Some - a desire to expand
We are all of us present through the draw of words, and the power within them.

To the night cats of the audience - play to the poetry in a unified rhythm
drum out a brand new beat generation - shoulders, hips, and finger-tips
rap-tap-tapping on the nearest available surface

Hit the mic if it's open - unclench those timid teeth and let go the flowing frustrations - give your shoulders a night off, and share the weight with us lest they develop a chip. And cast away what false application you have witnessed of the term "poet".

We are all of us, poets. Metaphor is common to the mortal mind, and with time, comes the ability to employ it. The weather reflects the mood of someone - and pathetic fallacy will follow.

We are all of us, poets - though we suffer illusions that we practice the elusion of allusion.

So speak, if you would speak - or listen, if you would listen. Just be sure to do as you would.

And to the listeners - we exist only due to you. Poetry inhales in the writing and exhales in the reading, The mouths and the ears - the heads and tails of this beautiful artform. Those receiving aurally what we deliver orally - let us inject ink through our words, and tattoo you in patterns of shared experience.

It is every writer's dream to change a fellow being to such an extent that it can be seen by the world around - so as to gesture to the effect, like an architect to a finished building, and say "I did that."

If you would, dear listeners, take our lives into your hands, heads, and hearts - take our experiences and our frivolities - take us by our hands, and let us march into eternity, marked by the lives of every poet we may or may not have ever met.