Nothing
A Useless Poem
Nothing
This poem does not make you feel your missing quantum of hope. It is not an expression of personality nor a reflection of aesthetic virtue. Nothing it says will help you build a street where neighbors think alike. It asks you to die for no sentiment nor indeed to live for any cause. No word it says or fails to say will compel you to forswear hate. It cannot build a clinic, feed a child. And yet, perhaps, it can turn away the splintered mirror of your mind toward an apprehension of reality.
All art is quite useless. And yet…
This induced in me the same mind knotting abstraction that a Koan achieves. I like how you state what the poem is not, and even at the end, the poem is defined by… absence.
My mind is unfortunately full of loud machines and receipts, but they did quieten a little bit. For what it’s worth.