Partially, A Poem From The New York Times

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ARS POETICA FOR THE ONES LIKE US
I like the story about the man who talks
God into letting him live until he is done
With his masterwork.

In some versions He is a painter, 

But in this one he is a singer

Who then sings every sentence, whose song
Becomes a poem that does not end

Because it is eternally revised. 

Who can say whether Orpheus, when he found honey
In other hives, did not sing to let the devil know

His body was alive? 

He was the first to grieve,
Years in advance, the news of his death.
At the wake I explained that the poem could be

Thought of as a house: a room where a boy
Undresses before a slightly older girl and vanishes
Inside her robe; a basement where the furnace

And pipes hold what keeps the house erect

...

TERRANCE HAYES ©
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