Some say that people
who like poetry
live in a rarefied world
populated with pretty words
and impractical thoughts
and naivete.

Yet, who among us
have to be told that a great deal
of life is drudgery and routine,
that there are bills to be paid,
that there are people who
do not wish us well.

People who love poems
know that a simple arrangement
of words will not re-arrange the world;
that ideals are sometimes
never achieved
and that simply putting
suffering into words
will not abolish it.

We poetry-lovers
do not need to be reminded
that the world is not always
turtle-doves and red roses,
but the sublime
and the magnificent
are also just as real