off the cuff

what i've learned about poetry
is that its ok to open your heart
and bleed or purr or maybe
even construct text, i've learned
that poets are quite mad and that
this is our perfect right to speak
up and out and inside out
because the sea is polluted
and we live under a harsh sun
where souls are hurting and death
is armed and roams the streets
where lives are pushed to the edge
as pain hides in the shadows
where you'll never find a pearl
unless it was dropped by a
little old lady without her glasses
we can write til the day we die
if we don't look at the audience
and believe they can see
into our souls