a poetry anthologya poetry anthology

Riq Lert

where i’m from

you ask where i’m from

i come from a timewhere either

there’s no such thing as spare timeor everything's spare time

 i come from a time

when i wasthe car

now i’m riq

i come from a timewhere i swing to stay afloat

now i point

i am mebut every day’s new

and i am made of every other me i’ve ever been.

if you want to know where i’m fromlook how i got from then to now

there to here 

you’ll know

he's coming

the knives are exposedtwo lasers look me in the eye

a bouncing ball of death comes my waytwo rows of spikes see me

the creature is a lion, a jaguar insideoutside its a cat

phil has come to play

phil

you can write a poem about anything

youtell me that i can write a poem about anything

   wrong 

 you

think i could write a poem abouta rusty, ragged, rickety old

bikewho has no owner

or home 

 wrong  

youthink i could write a poem about

that book over therejust chillin’ on the shelf

ready to pounce on the innocent passerbycoercing them to read 

wrong  

youthink i could write a poem about

little kids running aroundtogether

laughing, smilinglaughing

 wrong

  i don’t know anything about poetry

i couldn’t tell you what a stanza was if you askedno-one ever told me what a metaphor was

and this poem doesn’t even rhyme 

if you think i can write a poem about anything  you arewrong