The Exalted Ones

They meet in the back rooms of coffee houses,
wine bars and bookstores.  

Some send their stuff to the magazines.  

They write about rejection, isolation, 

the tragic human condition, failed love.

They drag their friends along to ensure applause
and run up the flag declaring 'POETRY NIGHT!'.

Organizers claim poetic awareness their intent,
but no one comes to the stage holding 

a god-damn unity candle for their audience.

Even the ones preaching Love and Peace

angle for the spotlight,

for a chance to be heard and understood.

They shout over cigarette smoke 

and cappuccino machines. 

Much of it is soft, overly-garnished
treatment of standard themes, 

or unintelligible, angst-riddled banter.

Professor observes from the corner table, 

applauding, half-sincere.  

He also writes poetry, a good deal more carefully.  

His collection of haiku is for sale

beside the pastry display.

Afterwards, they congratulate and embrace
as new hopes are raised and new poems
find their way to the desks of magazine editors.

I linger.  I clap.
I pick up the magazines.  

Nothing happens.

Has exalted poetry gone the way of the Aztecs?

Where is the voice that rattles the room,

that burns without permission?

Where is our Whitman?  Our Rimbaud?
Our howling Ginsberg?  

We trade polished lines, measured outrage,

small revelations calibrated for applause.

I await my turn at the microphone

longing to taste the exquisite madness 

of unbridled souls,
for a righteous voice to rise 

and torch this complacent landscape, 

deliver us from sedate, coffee-house prose, 

bloodless academics absent grit or vision, 

and tired, angry verse 

such as this.