Reset button

I take to singing about my flaws
make comedies of mood swings
and running from fights

foul up often enough
and hiding imperfection becomes exhausting

My life has no reset button
so
I wrestle with malfunctions
climbing into the attic
that is my brain
to drive out roosting starlings

and at my desk I crouch on a chair
and read my mail
looking for critique

loving constructive criticism strikes me
as masochistic

a person is never finished
edits and corrections might go on
ad infinitum
if Death did not intervene

I hate to disappoint you David but I have no critique. I like it as is.

We’ve all been there, and your work sums it up very nicely.

May I put on my writing tutor’s hat here for a few lines? For anyone and everyone who reads this.

If you believe absolute perfection is possible you are setting yourself up for permanent disappointment, and missing a hell of a lot of good stuff along the way.

That’s no way to flourish as a writer/poet.

Enjoy the journey, learn from any real disasters, and shrug off the rest as a passing inconvenience, a brief loss of faith in yourself.

If a particular style or form works well for you, then it obviously comes naturally, so use it. Don’t force yourself to write in ways that don’t fit, which feel like a strait jacket.

Most writing tutors will tell you this is good practice, that you’ll learn something from the experience. This is true, in that you’ll learn it doesn’t work. if you spend too long in this negative mindset it will start to nibble away at what you can do well.

Look at it this way, most people walk on their feet, once they’ve learned how. Those who walk on their hands are comfortable upside down. Most of us aren’t.

Gyppo

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I love it, David. To me, this is the crux of the poem:
My life has no reset button
so
I wrestle with malfunctions

I like the way you introduce the topic and then take it unexpectedly to:
roosting starlings

and at my desk I crouch on a chair…

There is not a thing I’d change. it’s great as it is.

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