One old poet to another: I don’t, anymore, s e e flowers. I cannot recall certain words, –Mate! d..D’ y’hear birds? i’ve no sense of the hours (clock stop’d ticking); and I am alone, I alone; yes-sh, with bumble-bee’s,Shh! i guess-sh, w e can..make, a poem! dig deeper fur it in other words wordless word-miner digging grey matter’s witt-a pick-axe, regardless, mining for words; but no gold..nor golden honey! (getting old). My hands I fold I sigh! in sunburn’t deserts of dry poetry’s hearing flowers, goo-il-ly..black as Texas crude, “Gusher!” carried on winds ta-b’yond Ashur..circling crustily overhead, crass croakings’ echoes among the dunes; our fine feathered friends! cast their long shadows at nap-time, –oily cow-skull for a pillow. (One..red-skinn’d, un-housed, undernourished, yesh, &parch’d! thin, naked poet’s carcass to the other): ?i say, “o! i say..Mate! can thish, really be..thee end!” ~c.