You'll See Poem by Dean Meredith

This is not a love poem
And I am not a poet
This is a declaration of war
And I am seething with anger
Sun Tzu would be appalled
Know your enemy, don't get angry
I've studied them, ten years now
I am a student, they our masters
They are the indentured academics
Our gatekeepers of the acceptable
Those pandering processors of pedantry
High priests & priestesses of punctuation
Full stops & commas above heart
When did all their souls die?
And were they ever really alive?
It was probably well drummed into them
From early on, all those arcane rules
They could have listened like Cummings
He heard the voodoo drums
Clubbing their victims to death
I'd rather hoped he'd freed us
From old fashioned slave misery
From rules that ruin the game
He was not alone, Cummings
Others no doubt with him too
With minds open enough to sift through
Keeping the best, rejecting the rest
Oh that's what we do, cry the literati
We sift through & save the deserving
Tho rejecting is what we truly do best
But we're good keepers too, oh yes
Don't forget that, only the very best
Shiniest, sparkling, obscurest refs
The ones only we know & we know best
How great our minds from all those books
All those golden myths we gaily digest
Showing how smart we are in our nests
We adore when common folk applaud us
For all that knowledge inside our heads

Then one of the students asks, says
Um, excuse me Sir/Ma'am, please is there
No place for passion still in poetry
Even if full stops & commas go missing
Isn't that what it's supposed to be about?
Feelings & thoughts & beauty & love
Oh no say the learned, heaven forbid
It's about discipline & structure & …
History, Philosophy, Psychology & …
Science, let's not forget that above all
Aesthetics went out years ago
Don't you know that? We threw it away
Along with religion & politics & truth
All most unnecessary for our fine art
All too … contentious, yes that's it
Causing too many arguments for us
No, we truly thrive on our ancient myths
They give us everything we need
In our great big conquering heads
Oh no, forget about all those other bits
Totally unnecessary for today's art
All that matters now is punctuation
And knowing only too well our myths
Our great big all-encompassing myths
Those ones that show off & swell
Our great big all-conquering heads
Learn & know your Greeks & Romans
Boys & girls, they're all you need
All you'll ever need, and of course
Don't forget the punctuation, yes
It's so very important, you'll see
The subtlety of a well-placed comma
The sublime sensuousness of a full stop