Why Do People Try To Force Me To Write A Certain Way Poem by James McLain

they pound at the door
with their long fingers,
longer than the night should be,
wanting me to shape it—
to fit their mold,
like bread dough,
like clay in a kid's hands.
but I'm not here for your forms,
not your pretty little boxes
or your polished lines.

I write like a dog runs
in the dead of August heat,
panting and desperate,
gasping for water,
and if it comes out jagged,
if it smells of whiskey
and the woman who left,
well, that's life,
that's my paper,
my ink.

they want me to iron it smooth,
to sew it all up neat,
like a suit for Sunday.
I don't do Sundays,
don't do pressed clothes,
my words wear torn shirts
and sleep on dirty couches,
and that's all they'll ever do.