sometimes poetry
is the equivalent of
a Jack in the Box
you turn pages
and you turn pages
and it is delightful
there is nature
there is life
and there is the ponderance
upon all that is good
until

BANG!

one them jumps out
and smacks you in the head
and you love it
or you hate it
because of what it made you feel
how it made you want
how it made you want to
to kill the poet
and never read again

it’s these few moments
that validate the writer
and the writing
they stick with you
in ways the bland never will