ARTIST Poem: Lessons, by Amelia Michelle Nicol

Poets opening for musicians.

Kerouac.
Poetry tv shows.

Olson.
To the Kerouac
Killed at a jazz show

Or the Adelaide
Who had a small tribe
For just a little while

The drunkenness in the likes
Of Maximus of Glouchster
Has decided the diving
Of any future dirty artists
Library or no

These tendencies are known
And the white collared
Have better ideas
For their poetry

Kept behind podiums
Or slammed at open mics
No space between them.

Save for the graces of politica

Lost to any ages

The graces of higher arts
These places for dignity
And divine, not dirty arts
And dirtier workers!

By Amelia Michelle Nicol