What Is This Stuff? Poem by Juan Olivarez

Poetry to me is to set yourself free
Your soul has to journey through uncharted seas
When you have a gift, i'm not saying I do
The letters and words spread like the flu.

They come together and merge in your mind,
You could put them on paper though your'e legally blind.
They flow from your pen with a veritable ease
And you hope in the end, that many they please.

Some I have read have no talent at all,
They mumble and jumble and bang into walls,
Yet who am i in this world to offend?
I am not a critic to rave or to rend.

Somebody should tell you that you cannot write,
Somebody that knows you, or sleeps with you at night.
They should'nt let you, make a fool of yourself,
They ought just to make you, put that stuff on the shelf.

Some have it some don't, and you never did,
Be kind to the public that stuff should be hid.
Your poetry should be tossed out into the cold,
Or better yet, buried in some deep dark hole.

I don't know what your passing, but poetry it's not
It smells something awful, like a chamber pot.
Don't wait for somebody, to redicule and scold,
You need to stop writing, have'nt you been told.

4/20/10 29 palms ca.