Billy Shakes has been dead
for four hundred years
but you wouldn’t know it
from all the talk.

Everybody knows his name.
Everybody knows his work.
Every student curses them both
if they know enough English.
Shakes thrives
in every form imaginable.
His online profile dwarfs mine
despite being so long gone.

Personally
I never saw the appeal.
I like a good concrete story
not with all those allusions
and falutin of the highest order.
It just gets tiresome,
you know?

Those statutory scenes, though
and the cosplay in the comedies…
those seem pretty punk.

Fine, then.
Maybe there’s something in Shakes
for just about everyone
but I do wish he’d ease up a bit
release his stranglehold on theater
and let me get my plays produced
– once I write any…