THE HUNDREDTH POEM

Our poet finally signed in blood on the dotted line. 
The terms called for a hundred poems, no more, no less, 
each exponentially better than the one before. 
And accomplished without his attending a workshop, 
or going for a master’s degree in creative writing,  
or studying at the famouspoet.com webpage. 
The thirtieth finally got published in a well-known regional journal. 
The fortieth made Poetry, and the fiftieth The New Yorker, 
for it’s all in the networking of course, 
and those editors had also signed with the poet’s agent 
The sixtieth was submitted without an s.a.s.e.,  
for acceptance everywhere was guaranteed, 
more for his established name than evolving skill. 
But finally, a seamless segue between poet and poem 
The seventieth was actually decent, and the eightieth almost good. 
The ninetieth put Shakespeare’s sonnets to shame. 
The ninety-ninth was the object of art-cinema movie rights. 
Then that hundredth. 
The red-faced, cloven-hooved, pointed tailed,  
pitchfork holding agent hovered over him, 
like a waiter fidgeting with the check after serving dessert. 
And then that all-star funeral service. 
The editors of Poetry and The New Yorker gave eloquent eulogies 
while looking nervously over their shoulders. 
Twenty years later his verse haunted remainder bins, 
but two or three were still cited in A Freshman’s Guide to Poetry. 
Three centuries passed and the name he etched in blood long ago, 
was legally changed in the court of divine retribution 
to anonymous.

BIO:  “As Marx (Groucho, not that German guy with a beard) once said, ‘Any club that would have me for a member I wouldn’t want to join.’ But then why should I spare you from your folly. My name will forever be linked to Cherry Bleeds. Remember, this is the internet. A thousand years from now, when George Bush’s visage will appear on Mount Rushmore as the wisest, most articulate of our presidents, somewhere in some dank basement of the great web work of computers my name will still be linked you yours in the electronic reverberations haunting the net.”