Poets Don't Allow Poems To Take An Aeroplane Poem by PRATHAP KAMATH

Poets don't allow poems to take an aeroplane;
they are afraid of the heights
it might take their lines to.

They believe that poetry should stand
firmly on firm ground.

If it flies, it should fly on its own wings,
not in an aeroplane to non-human heights.

For from those high altitudes a poem,
they believe, might seethings
that would appear too small,
which are to us so big down here.

A poem should help us see things
in their true size and colours;
not so, if a poem looks down
from an air-borne plane.

A poem should not be cut loose
like a kite from its thread;
it may look cute in its mad flight, but
only like a an aeroplane nose-diving
to the ocean far below on the earth.

Poets don't allow poems to take an aeroplane;
they are afraid of the heights
it might take their lines to.