SAD ROBOTS
clean steel: inflexible, but
where they’re strong
is where they’re weak. ginsu knives,
not flesh, they cut themselves, and fall apart.
what do they want?
to be waterfalls or give new leaf
to bend, unclench
to grow a peach
—from Rattle #35, Summer 2011
Tribute to Canadian Poets
__________
James Arthur: “Some poems take me years to finish, because even after a dozen bouts of revision, I can tell that something about the poem isn’t right. Eventually, I persuade myself that the poem is done, and I send it out into the world, but maybe I never fully forgive my reluctant poems for having caused me so much grief, because the poems of my own that I like best are the ones that seemed to arrive effortlessly, sometimes in a single afternoon. ‘Sad Robots’ is one. It was fun to write, and it still brings me pleasure.” (web)
