(For Bernard)
The book of poetry
you just handed me
was boring
and I could not get through much of it
by which I mean
I couldn’t read shy of it.

I wanted to.
I wanted to be impressed by your offering
to receive it in the spirit it was given
and then to have thoughtful thoughts to say
when next we spoke.

I had little to say about the text
because most poetry is boring
and this book
was mostly poetry
so it was mostly boring.
Boring!
I was bored by your book
and I’m sorry
and I wish I had more ability to appreciate that artistic form but come on:
we all know the thing about poetry.

It’s mostly boring.