Pandas do not mate in captivity.
In their human-made paradise
Pandas clown and play.
Aggression between competing males
in the wild stimulates the female
and saves the Panda bear.
She doesn’t want to have children so she doesn’t care.
She lives on the upper east side
where millions of other liberals reside,
convinced nature needs saving.
Those in rural areas, where nature is cruel,
believe humans need saving. They are old school.
Success always has two purposes
which are completely at odds.
Mozart has far more discipline than you
and by that ratio is far more playful than you, too.
I am a novelist who writes poems about women who live on the upper east side
and their furniture and their flowers and their walks in the park
and the poetry in novels leaves me cold.
When I read a novel I feel myself getting old.
It takes but a moment to be inspired,
but the pleasure must be longer than that.
Respect what’s quick, but add some fat.
Respect length, but do not be
Saturn in your Lake District poetry.