Here's To The Non-Conformists (Poetry)

Pretty much anyone can write a poem
but relatively few can do it well
adulation varies with the critic
who either drools or gives the author hell

Certain names go in and out of fashion
literature is fickle — often vain
some make a pound while some don’t earn a nickle
unless nostalgia prints their book again

The upper echelons hang on to heroes
the universal hooks that culture knows
remain the mainstay of such institutions
that try to govern every wind that blows

But there are mavericks who buck the system
do it their way and don’t give a damn
for it’s pointless being anything but truthful
so what they write reflects the inner man

They gather brickbats or bouquets that wither
posterity might take them to its heart
or bury that small voice as though it never
had anything of value to impart

There’s countless words on endless reams of paper
lines that non-conformist poets bled
old notebooks bulging — all their lives unpublished
still waiting, hoping, dying to be read