by Hugh Mann

Created on: December 10, 2008   Last Updated: April 18, 2009

Society does not need poets
Nor does it need dancers, painters, sculptors, or whores,
Neither musicians, magicians, jugglers, and more
Neither tamers of lions, billionaire's scions, athletes, oracles or
Comedians, palm and tarot card readers,
Benders of spoons, religious leaders,
Or any purveyors of dubious ilk

Not to suggest that the poet and tarot card reader
Are both cut from the same ethical cloth,

The latter's a parasite, a loathsome charlatan
A pathetic, dependent, intellectual sloth
Whereas
The poet's a literate weaver of words
Conjuring, clashing, conveying thoughts
Heartfelt and wished and frivolous
While masquerading sinister plots
Yet, the "ilk" shared with the tarot card reader?
No life sustaining work is accomplished

Life sustaining work is
Cutting grass, feeding a baby, designing anti-lock brakes
A medical checkup, roofing a house
Fixing a faucet, and manufacturing a cardboard box,
Negotiating, litigating, and building a bridge,
Conducting children safely across a school zone,
Administering psychiatry, paving a street
Installing software, preparing a meal,
Launching defensive military counter-attacks.
You know the list by now,
And the list goes on..

Consider an exchange
of the
Product of the effort of a chicken farmer
for the
Product of the effort of a poet laureate
then the
Farmer would starve on verbal ingenuity
while the
Belly of the poet would be full

How barren, empty, void and devoid
And chilly, and frigid, and cold
Life would be
Without the humanities
Without the arts
Without the poetry
Some might accuse

Wager, I would, that more poets
and musicians
and actors
and sports
and more celebrity stars
Suffer from mental illness and dis-
association

from

reality

than

People whose minds and hands
Are concretely occupied,
Producing actual material results:
The proverbial farmer,
The prosaic engineer,
The doctor, the grocer, and the student pushing
A mower across a lawn
The list goes on..
..and poets aren't on it

Me, I have a passion for poetry,
especially composing it. If I found myself with a receptive audience, to whom I could publish my works, I would definitely exploit the pecuniary opportunity and invest any proceeds in real estate development.

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