Pardon My Laugh

I try to write a graceful line

which i think of as only mine,

but then a rhyming line arrives

and no aphorism survives.

My graceful line won’t stay single.

My poem becomes a jingle,

and after my sonnet is done

that first line is nothing but fun.

Taking myself seriously

ain’t characteristic of me,

and yet my poems seem to say

my readers should do it my way.

I don’t mean to write sermonettes

but the elf within me forgets.

Walt Abbott–7-21-2009