William Carlos Williams, famous

local doctor, spark plug

of his landscape, set of wheels

for his community, delivering

babies among sexy

poor people who couldn’t,

or wouldn’t,

always pay, and some of them

I loved a little too well, and one of them

I loved,

much too well.

Herman Melville, harpooneer

of Moby Dick, became an Inspector of Things

with no visible promotions

for nineteen years.

But I was working

by the seashore, near the sailor

who broke my heart, which usually

made me feel better, because,

by now, I was

the mystical mariner, and the sea

was in my eyes

wherever I was.

Miguel de Cervantes, who wrote

and was windmill-tilting

Don Quixote, Sancho Panza, Dapple, Rocinante, and

Dulcinea, gorgeous, beautiful Dulcinea,

the most perfect love,

romantic angel,

with such a long pen,

was a tax collector on horseback

for too many years.

People would throw things at

us.

And I wondered

how I had become

this.

I said to myself,

“How have I become

this

weary, sad-eyed, wine-soaked,

broken-hearted old soldier

with a bad hand from that long-forgotten

sea battle no one seems to remember

but me.

Next, I was a slave,

captured by pirates.

Later writing many

chapters of my only, endless

book while locked up

in their jail.

For something I probably didn’t do

and don’t remember

if I did do it.

Because someone stuck up

was down

on my energy.

As a noble Roman said somewhere, in jail

being where

more than one good book has been

penned.

For love.

In blood.”