Audiences. I am struck by their title to work
as the end in themselves; how has entertainment
become a key ingredient on the back of the country's
economic cereal box? I ask, but I am answered, by the
market value, a price's willingness to be paid. Sweet
demanders, your supply of options is a multiple choice
with only fine print to reveal that none of the above
can be your number two's top ranked mechanical shave. It's
a beard of a thing, to be watched; do the observers see the
face or the individual hairs? And the big question: who
am I to know what is better than what? And who I am
to board the train, whose cars are ordered by pen and
ladder ink? I will neither supply nor demand. I will
sleep and wash dishes and cook food and do what is
needed for the person I appear to be to myself, and
the creatures I have the reach to touch. Where, then,
does poetry fit? Is it an excuse for halting, inattentive
speeches? Will they be read or red or purple? I am blue
with the face that cowers under an early afternoon sky
and cannot remember to breathe for want of the right
river of sentences, spaced by sips and heard as a clack
on the keyboard that translates my mind. Well, it's
in your hands. You demanders. You reprimanders.
You squanderers and builders and bricks. I may
not be at your service or your mercy, but my
work withers unless you gaze.
Roman Ryan 