The Poet"s Garbage Can

The Poet's Garbage Can

A famous picture of W.H.Auden

Visualizes him with a garbage can.

The lid held in his left hand.

He wears a neat suit.

The can has a metallic shine.

What does he put in that can?

Or does he represent every poet

Who throws out the garbage

Of the creative mind.

This garbage might represent

A great loss to the readers

Of poetry, words and thoughts

That might benefit another person

Teetering on the edge of loneliness

Or sanity in an hour of strife.

We'll never know the thoughts

Of Crane, Plath, or Rochester,

A poet I knew as a young man

Who impressed so many.

Now he is unknown,

except to his remaining family,

And friends who made mistakes

With their friendship.

Perhaps the garbage can represents

The loss of all poets to history,

All their poems trashed by unknown

Companions or humanity in general.

We will never know because

This poem will go the way

Of all poems eventually,

Of all poets eventually,

Of all strings of words

In search of meaning,

In search of another human

To feel what Wilfred Owen felt

Searching on those stairs

That lead him to the garbage can

Of world wsr

That was France and death

In November of 1918.

What poems had a bullet hole

In his tunic? covered in blood.

My mentor told me to never

Use the word blood in a poem,

But what are poems but blood

Coursing from the mind

Through the voice

Across the distance

As vibration heard or unheard,

Ultimately ignored in

The garbage can of time.

Barry G. Wick