The inspiration that came from my admiration
for a dramatic and beautiful foreign acrobat
now makes my lonely poems seem to glow.
Everyone around me
agrees that I’ve grown.
The field where that circus stood
is just a scattered mass of trampled grass,
and I have to go back to school,
but while I sit motionless,
forced to listen
to rigid grammar lessons,
my mind wanders through old rhymes,
trying them over and over again
in new patterns.
Yes, broken hearts have a purpose,
writing verses to comfort
others.