How Do I Do It? Poem by Fred Babbin

I can say with rhyme or meter
Thoughts that I would not repeat
Or put into prosaic words-
I would never ever say them that way.

Often they are too complex.
And the feelings cannot be
Expressed in any other way,
In any other ordinary words.

Once I have them on the paper,
I can see the words as something
greater than my thought at first
had seemed to be.

Thus my yearning becomes learning.
And my passion opens up so many meanings
that I really hadn’t seen
until I put them on the paper.

Then my vap’rous fuzzy thoughts
become solidified when I
can see them and retwist them
in the way a blacksmith twists his steel.

Because my words are limited
to rules and forms left all unspoken,
I am forced to come up with
A different way to show my feelings,
Which I do.

And so, dear reader, I have tried
To tell you how my thoughts and
Feelings get reformed into the words
That you can read and see expressed here,
When I craft my poesy.