Personae i’ve identified with, acted out for weeks
i pined to be a Martyr with a Quill, held in stony pose: gazing far beyond my gathered mourners.
i pined to be a noble onyx monument, a weeping Queen & flowers my adornment.
am less in need of praise, now. the Poem i made, it pleases me, the Poem per se is pleasing.
OR my pleasure's pseudo-indy: clapping i’ve internalized. my Poem i judge superb, and from my judgement i infer my proper Audience—a People whose applause i would prefer.
it's their love i feel, when i poetize!
am NOT prone to think these days i am Jesus Christ
lotsa Doktor Faust material, lotsa Messiah monologues.
and gloomy Moral Prophet spiels, Asthenic Writer's dying wit, the Ingénue Seeker’s bits—
and now, in my senescence, in my early-come senescence, it's the Kindly Steward essaylets: bubble-thots for Garfield's John or Curious George’s gent.
Personae i’ve identified with, i’ve acted out for weeks, and i’ve writ them strong speeches.
am NOT prone think these days i am Jesus Christ, that i truly sold my soul for an open Book of Nature.
i may have come close—
enough to get me in my role & flirting with psychosis—
so later i could write it, make it plausible as verse!