[Emxistential] The Spiracle Manifesto

 Should it be a blend of the exotic and avant garde? Metered or free-flowing? Sardonic or, epic?

What makes a poem tick for us?

My Ideal Poem

1.        As a reader

a.      Be easy, but not fawning –

Words as candies, landmarks, unwrapped,

Exposed by sin of careless omission,
or overexposition, leaving little

Or, none
to the virginal vision

Make me a pioneer

Exploring new

Civilizations

b.       Because the body can only take so much

Always the mind leans toward the sunset, dusk,

Dawn, baby’s touch, things soft and subtle

Therefore, if it cannot impersonate the moon

It must razzle-dazzle, stun, be entertaining

Enough for the spirit to look again, recoil, leap

Ballerina in a dance of (un)words

            Style as form and function

                        Holding both the audience and stage captive, entranced

                        Terpsichorean’s swan

Song

c.        & where indulgence is inevitably human –

Student peeking at review notes

Bungee jumper before the jump, revalidating

What is already known, sometimes

It must allow for the diametric opposition –

What Arabic calligraphy is to Greek

Apocalypsis before Genesis,

Ending before beginning;

d.       Hence, Be

That as it may, let the piece stand, god-like

As a captain alerting me to go

Back to start, because truth is

Irreversible

       2. As a writer

True poets know when,

When not to (un)word, therefore, it ought to

Be punctuated properly

In short, Just 
Revere

What's too good to be
Worded,

 ©2011 Emeniano Acain Somoza, Jr. Co-Editor, Spiracle