My First and Indeed My Last -- A Poem in 12 Fits or Starts

~William Griffin FIT I. Not that there's anything wrong with that, no, a poem on water? if I may begin where I'll end. My mistake! FIT II. I'd complained in public, I should've known better, that never in my writing life did anyone ask me to write a poem, or assign me the task. And so the Poet, the Master Poet, the Poetaster, the Sonneteer Siníster, slapped me in the face with one. What's more, he laid down the rules. FIT III. Typically, one would have thought him Roman or Italic, but no, typographically, he was Greek Orthodox, Extra Bold Extended, Display Caps only. FIT IV. "Title?" I asked. "‘A Poem on Water,'" he replied. "With water music?" I asked. "I could Handel that." "No music," he replied, unable to handle a note himself. "First word?" I asked. "Not," he replied. "Not?" I asked. "Naught but a not," he replied. "Naughty but nice," mused I, notting along to be nice. "But many are the nots, not spelled the same, not meant the same." "It's nice to be naughty," he nodded, his reasoning knotted. "End with a not or else pay the price!" FIT V. "Stanza?" I dared ask. "Four Tercels, or three Quattros," he dared reply. "That's more than I can afford," I humm-mm-mmed, but to a dealership I hied where a parking lot of Stanzas I espied. Who'd ‘ve thought a Stanza Civic to be so pricey, but I did find a pre-owned one that was rather nicey. FIT VI. "Caesura?" I asked further. "I come to bury Caesura, not to phrase him!" he replied further with what I thought was a little too much bravura. "End rhyme?" I had to know. "No end rhyme!" he had to tell. "No end rhyme? Did you hear that, ladies and gentlemen? He says No end rhyme!" "It's about time, don't you think?" he asked rhetorically. FIT VII. "But what about feet?" I countered sillily. "Surely a poem has to have feet if it's to travel, not to creep." "What think you of Mr. Iamb?" he asked icily. "I'm nuts about Mr. Iamb," I replied heartily, "and I'm crazy for his hat." "Miss Anapest it is then," he said irenically. "Not in your top knot!" I announced iratedly. "Mr. Iamb it is then," he spouted apophatically, "but you'll live to regret it!" FIT VIII. "I-amb Who-amb," Mr. Iamb once said to me in a moment of private revelation; "thou shalt not have false feet before thee!" So iamb it is then, iamba cum viol de gamba! FIT IX. Those were the rules, that was the assignment, flung like a pie right into my mush. Cream, yes, but shaving, not whipped— such was his menthol operandi that I sent him tumbling onto his tush. FIT X. A Laureate without laurels he was; a Poet on water himself, in summer swanning in thick algae, in winter coruscating on thin ice. More Neptune than Naiad, drowning end rhymes like kittens— that was his devious intention... but he was ill, the Poet; something to do with water retention. FIT XI. His wooden frame topped by a facial fuzz, in smart contact with smooth surface, would leap to flame. Alas, it was me he wanted to torch with this "poem on water," and I in my humility am all too incendiary. To burn or to drown, those were his only concerns. FIT XII. I shall end where I began, with a naught, not that there's anything wrong with a knot, as long as it's a knot with a knoose, not a burnoose, just a nuisance to be noosed. To tie a knot, alas, I cannot, at least all by myself; someone else must help. But now, alone at last, all by myself, more ebullient than a Booleant, I can write a poem truly my own, not having to begin with a not, or a knot, or a naught]. Not that there's anything naughty with a not.... But I won't! Definitely Not Dedicated to Scott Cairns.