! ! To A Fellow Poet Poem by Michael Shepherd

What can I give you –
for only giving can I think of,
in this dark season of the year
which needs no festive name, to name the need…

this dark season, when hearts yearn
for all that’s bright, and warm, and love..
what can I give you, at this time?

I give you – music… music, heard
outside the heart’s dark winter door
to say, that all’s not lost; all’s never lost;
there’s music still and always, through the door…
you’ll hear, and know yourself to be that all…

I give you – laughter… laughter, on the face
of strangers, as you open that dark door;
strangers who laughing turn to you
and share their laughter and a proffered hand;
a room of laughter shared with you, illusions laughed away…

As poet gives to poet, these I give you;
they are – but poetry;
as poetry, may live.

*

[occasioned by discussion of ‘the three persons’ in poetry:
the confessional poetry of ‘I’;
the poetry that speaks and gives to ‘you’;
and the poetry of he, she, it, they – of universal truth..]