down the years we’ve had want to be poets,
following some scheme or plan,
some poets are the real deal,
the do it because they can,
it’s not about forcefully writing,
to please a ready made audience,
some poets did it like breathing,
it just seeped out into the press,

and tragedy becomes a verse,
an artist a part of a curse,
no hiding place under the harsh lights,
demons run unchained in endless nights,

being famous brings a tight rope,
being forgotten brings despair,
being free and proud and healed,
are trophies that are so rare,

only dark times are remembered,
the despair clouds over the smiles,
remembered for a drink or a snort or two,
never for the genius , only the things wild.

how many artists can you name,
who lost their path in some way,
a car , a drug, vomit , antidepressants,
choking, unconscious , gone , mourned.

only the music and the words remain,
and a vandalized , over worshipped tombstone,
another artist vanishes from our lives,
another genius who just couldn’t be alone.

well Mr. Morrison, Miss Winehouse,
Marc Bolan , Janis and Jimi,
kurt and Elvis maybe even Sid,
we all still love you and what you did.

some artists are harder to forget,
some poets were never really understood,
even for what they wrote was never real,
it was only ever written in their blood.

time moves on, other words come,
and a new audience will follow,
somebody will drink too much, feel to little,
end up getting famous and feeling hollow,

so what’s in a bloody poets mind,
the real damned poets cursed to succeed,
tortured in the press, battered to hell,
all in the name of art, death is a sell.

poet , poet write what you will,
do it so that it doesn’t make you ill,
write on, write long, write for many years to come,
we want your work to live, and you as well.

poetry in a bookshop,
a book full of dust,
hidden memories inside,
edited out over a century,
words now muddled, no meaning,
as if the artist had lied.

best of a poet, just in a compilation,
chapters left on the publishers floor,
what’s left a confused , no sense, rabble,
with no soul or heart or mind.

what we really crave is the original,
straight from the bloody poets mind,
the vinyl LP of Morrison Hotel,
and other treasures we should find.

unedited and untranslated,
spelling mistakes left untouched,
a gold mine if found at all,
something not so appreciated that much.

so together let’s find more words,
poured from a bloody poets mind,
but when that poet becomes unstable,
be thoughtful , be human , patient and kind.

©D.Hobson December 2013