Spectator Sport

I’ve been making an effort to read more lately.
Television was really entertaining for a while
but got to the point of seeming as though it were
poking me in the third eye with an antenna.
It was funny the first time it happened, but still.

Now I’m reading pieces that aren’t always obvious
or even accessible. Or sometimes even good. But,
you know, I want to expand my horizons and make
an attempt to become more extensive, to spread myself
like pâte across my life, a nice thick layer.

What I really want the opportunity to accomplish,
while I read instead of working out at the gym
(since I had to adjust my priorities) is to find
some writer, someone whose writing I can call
“supple,” whose lines are supple lines, lithe and agile.

“Damn,” I’ll go, “Those are some supple lines!”
I’ll watch them bend and make shapes I didn’t know,
forms I hadn’t thought, though I excel at grammar.
I look forward to experiencing a sinuous stream
of diagonal eloquence, rhythmic gymnastics, poetic athletics.

And then another writer will writhe into view,
a stylistic wrestler, a mound of sinew and thews
(also a pleasure to say), a rope tangler who can
wrangle tropes to fit his or her will, torquing
ordinary concepts into wrought ornamental vines.

So I read a little more, hoping for the mat and the rodeo,
trying to keep my balance as my toes hit the beams
set before me, trying to ride the pommel horse,
to break the palomino, to forge figures that add up,
shine, shoe a steed. I read and try not to slip.