Will Poetry Make You Money? Poem by Roy Lee

My friend, Peter asked me last night
“Will your poetry make you money? ”
A question that gave me quite a fright
And kept me up on a sleepless journey


So I listened to the romance of Elvira Madigan
And from the Marriage of Figaro, that knave
Music to inspire feelings so deep in man
While Mozart lies in a pauper’s grave.


I saw the colours and swirls of Van Gogh’s brush
A man so tormented that he lost his ear
But in galleries the crowds gather in a hush
And admire the beauty and not the fear.

I remember a young man spraying graffiti on a wall
As ‘vandalism’, there is a ban
So he painted anonymously for no pay at all
To make his mark and show that he can.

Dylan Thomas laid drunk at the White Horse Inn
Exhausted by his verses and opinion
Dying from too much liquor and too much sin
But for his poetry, Death shall have no Dominion


The image of God under St. Peter’s dome
Designed to Michelango’s fashion
With all the ancient architecture of Rome
That celebrates creation and human passion.

Now a banker lays prostrate on a hospital bed
In his hands is a statement of his worth
His eyes are blank but he stares ahead
Those dollars are the memorial of his birth.