NAPOMO (national poetry month for you uninitiated) FAN MAIL UNE: It was John Berryman who stated last I remember very astutely 'poets don't get much fan mail' in his wryest intonation that often rendered him maniacal but genius, yes, too. It is true. For NAPOMO Ima gonna remedy that by firstly giving Richard Siken fan mail saying Richard Siken I love you for many reasons: (1) this poem. THIS POEM. / (2) for that offhand comment at Che's when you said I remind you of someone. and I said to you, oh yeh I get that all the time. and when you said Condoleeza Rice I fell for you; and when you said you'd trust me to run the country I thought now that is one tall order but I loved you anyways cause you were joking & not-joking & then I called you lil Dicky Siken & it was last call.

About the Boats

Boat. War. Song. Wine.There is a sound inside the word.
Fighting. Many. Fire. Drowning.We wanted to find that sound.

To love a man, you must find the boy
inside him. To love a boy, you must
unclench your fist and set down
your weapons. All men carry within

themselves the boys they have been,
their childish dreams, their earliest
wounds. A man betrays himself
when he smiles widely.

It isn’t fair to love someone. It isn’t fair.

There is a sound inside the word still
open to interpretation; a personal sigh,
not yet a common language, meaning
in the slosh, an exhalation between

the consonants. Tutelage is the search
for yourself inside another. Fatherhood
when the boys approach each other.
War, when the boys have nothing in common.

What does one do with a beautiful boy?
The options: protect or ravage. Thunderous options.
Timothy. Ganymede. Miltiades.
Anyway, a boy makes his own storm clouds.

Do not underestimate me. I was not helpless.Nothing was founded inside me that I did not request.

from Likestarlings.com