TERRA SETZLER

Imitation of “pencil” by marianne boruch

So many people demand my respect

The word respect looks a lot like resent

I resent those who demand my action

I deal in ethos, you must show me why

I respect those who can admit they’re wrong

How should I know that you are talking fair?

Fair, seems about as real as a fairy

How often does someone get a fair chance?

We are known for our past, not our future

No one cares about your life tomorrow

People want to know how you got to now

Respect is the word on everyone’s lip

you must respect all those who have more years

I bow to no king, I stand tall and strong

Respect is a currency gained with time

The wealth overspent by the proud

Wealth is a material possession

Health is the strenght you carry along

It It is the beginning and end of life

No amount of fake self importance will

bring more friends, family, time or money

Life is earned in true kindness and friendship

I give respect to those who show they care

Not by saying they did at one point

Words blow over me like a gust of wind

They might whip my hair up for a moment

But in the end, they can’t change all that much

There is nothing behind the words and wind

I wait for something I can see or feel

I only learn through my experience

______________________________________________

My drawing teacher said: Look, think, make a mark.

Look, I told myself.

And waited to be marked.

Clouds are white but they darken

with rain. Even a child blurs them back

to little woolies on a hillside, little

bundles without legs. Look, my teacher

would surely tell me, they’re nothing

like that. Like that: the lie. Like that: the poem.

She said: Respond to the heaviest part

of the figure first. Density is

form. That I keep hearing destiny

is not a mark of character. Like pilgrimage

once morphed to mirage in a noisy room, someone

so earnest at my ear. Then marriage slid.

Mir-aage, Mir-aage, I heard the famous poet let loose

awry into her microphone, triumphant.

The figure to be drawn —

not even half my age. She’s completely

emptied her face for this job of standing still an hour.

Look. Okay. But the little

dream in there, inside the think

that comes next. A pencil in my hand, its secret life

is charcoal, the wood already burnt,

a sacrifice.