11:36 a.m. I’m a little later than usual. I was putting the finishing touches to a talk I’ll be giving later on poet laureates.

Did you know I get stage fright?

And yet, I hunger for attention. I guess that’s the fate of a writer. We work so much in solitude and then we want attention for our work, our thoughts, our selves.

There might be a poem in this.

Spoken word is the format of the day
play with that you poet you
who longs for attention for your words
thirst for love is a crime
time will be your enemy, friend
end this poem before it takes you too far
starlight is bright, but not for poets

can't rhyme that, can you?

11:42 a.m. Haha! I may have accidentally created a new form. I had no idea where it was going until I hit the end. I didn’t look up any rhyming words until then, and I only did that to see if there really weren’t any good ones for “poets”. I kind of like it. It uses rhyme, but not in a traditional way. Let’s add punctuation and maybe a title.

Poet Rap
by Michelle Garren-Flye

spoken word is the format of the day;
play with that, you poet, you
who longs for attention for your words!
thirst for love is a crime—
time will be your enemy; friend,
end this poem before it takes you too far!
starlight is bright, but not for poets.

can't rhyme that, can you?

11:46 a.m. That was fun. Thanks for joining and feel free to let me know what you think.