The Poet's Dilemma Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

I've held out hopes
in florets, a lavender stem
the spear to flip out

the midget fly that grows
into a firestorm,

a phoenix devouring a finch
and the world's
cinder-burnt flesh, all hope
in embers and ashes.

(ii)

I've been blowing trumpets,
eurychones widening
mouths to chow down
the large head of a schema,

legs flipped out
into clipped feathers,
only a rachis
stroking me like chopped wind,

barbs the zephyr's
robbing voice warming up
a piece of flattery flipped out
in after-feathers.

(iii)

When a three-armed gale
storms a poet's door
with a thunderclap and a lazy knock,

a feather slims down
into barbules and hooklets -
too soft to make

the poet's eagle fly
with a pounce and arch
to claw off

a roaring lion's flesh, schema too tough
for a reader to grab.