WORD
Word,
I'll undress your laciness,
Peel the frills from your body,
Wipe the vulgarities from your face.
I'll flip you around on my tongue,
Slide you smoothly through my teeth,
Press you gently to the roof of my mouth,
Breathe you in and out of me.
I'll take you home and wash away your bad name.
I'll keep you well punctuated,
Dress you up in adjectives,
Cradle you in parenthesis.
People have warned me
that you spread easily through vulgar vocabulary
and dance a lurid lingo.
They say you hang in the crowds of a bad cliché,
That you run frivolously in seductive sentences.
Behind your back people call you a
Syntax slut.
That you use freely adverbs and pronouns,
That you have shown your face in loose enunciation,
That you'd do anything for a good conjunction.
You want to be free like all of your
Slang friends.
But I have spoken you so often
I feel you will become clear.
I've repeated you again and again through my brain.
It may be too late.
I've been humming you sweet in my sleep.
— Kristin K. Messner
In the richness of language,
it's grace, breadth, dexterity,
lies its power.
To speak with clarity, brevity and wit is like holding a lightning rod.
~ James Salter
Poet's Corner
