Pledge to a Poem

(This is the first white, well, white-ish December morning here this year...
But by the time the rain has run its course I think it will disappear)

Dear Poem,

I will strive to do you justice

Dress you in the cloth of word

Shape the sighing of your river

Into voice where thought, ink-stirred

Sights unuttered implications

Of a world beyond the cries

Of task's regimental duty

I will look into your eyes

…and soft-touch you like a lover

Sensing more than exposed skin

I’ll endeavor to uncover

The person pulsing within

And with patient, trembling fingers

I will brave fear’s leering curse

Dare to paint syllabic pictures

And impression into verse

Then, with pen bring into being

That which never was before

I will strive to do full justice

To the call of troubadour

As I draw you from a wellspring

Nectar waiting to become

Poured to page; clothed yet word-naked

To the title-ship of Poem

© Janet Martin