Dammit: More Words About Words
“Scattering words like careless pebbles
Beside the worn and weary path”.
NO! NO! NO!
A trope too often used
And laden with too much baggage
To be of any use here.
Discard. Delete.
Words are the coin of my realm
And legal tender in this land.
The worth of this coin
Is what you make it
(in agreement with me).
Trading then, is a perilous task.
The exchange can be fraught with
Misunderstanding and misrepresentation
Leading to literary bloodshed.
We all have words of a sort.
Some words are fashionable and hi-brow.
They are dropped in ready-made circles
Among the literati
And have little value.
Some words are workers
And have enormous impact.
Huddling busily around the Queen,
Fanning her, feeding her.
Their lot is to work and die.
Some words are architects.
They set the tone of the Project.
They design impossible structures.
They know the stresses that will come to bear
And offer support
For what is to be.
What distinguishes the wordsmith
From all the pretenders?
Discernment and discretion.
Discernment born of
Training, inclination, vision,
Chance, fate, destiny,
And susceptibility to flights of imagination.
Discretion is the ability to cull
Unnecessary and diversionary trappings
From the body of your work
Without undue emotion.
A critical and necessary skill.
Pare it down to quantum levels,
Identify the smallest piece,
Then start to work.
THE POET & HIS AUDIENCE
The poet’s implied contract:
“If you work with me,
I’ll work with you”
Is a perfect example of the barter system,
a Mutually beneficial exchange.
But this is all distraction.
The price of my merchandise
Is still words.
Words have value in-and-of themselves.
They stand alone and all have meaning.
But when strung together
With purpose and intent
They transform into
A message with meaning where
The whole is greater than
The sum of its parts.
If I can bear the cost of producing it,
Is there not someone with the coin To buy it?
Aren’t two sparrows sold for a penny?
at least spare me that.
If you are going to participate, my reader,
you need coin of the realm
And be willing to part with it.
one penny will do.
I am a thief
Stealing more than a few Poetic Devices
To further my purpose.
I have flailed about for decades
Alone and adrift
on A sea of words.
Palimpsest 
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