When I grow up ..

I woke to my usual routine ... turned on the computer, set the pot of coffee to brew, walked back to the computer to dial up and log in; while that was happening ... s l o w l y ... I let the dog out, walked back to the kitchen to fix the first cup - just a little half n half (prefer the real thing, but sometimes settle for the white stuff and only drink it light when I make it myself or order it in a cafe/coffee house in southern Louisiana - otherwise it is too weak to take the jolt); I let the dog back in, head back to the computer with the coffee cup warming the palm of my hand and easing the morning arthritic ache in my fingers, then click on my 'favorites'.

There's the folder here of MSN Groups, one of Blogs and a special one for Poetry Sites. I often save that one for last. It is a savoring experience. One most enjoyed when approached tentatively - with the electricity of anticipation, the yearning built from abstinence, and the knowledge that fulfillment will be sure and complete.

It was. A favorite site is Poetry Daily, http://poems.com/. This morning my foraging brought me to a poem by William Greenway, which is a jewel in itself ...

The insurance will pay for nine
pills a month, he says. Out of what
hat did they pull that number?
- from Aesop at Sixty

Having falling immediately in love with a man who could write so eloquently, honestly and sincerely about the pills to enhance erectile dysfunction, I had to know more about him. And, in my foraging through google, I found this most delicious quote which contains a most delicious quote:

To live without poetry is to risk living only on the surface. I like what William Carlos Williams says:

It is difficult
to get the news from poems
yet men die miserably every day
for lack
of what is found there.

All these writers urge me to do all I can to spread the word that poetry is not a hobby, but a way of living more fully.
- poet William Greenway

For me, too, poetry is not a hobby. I came to poetry late ... to steal from another quote ... and I could say it has transformed who I am. But the really telling effect is that it has transformed who I want to be.