le destitute

I could never clean my plate of
all the poetry you dropped onto it.
I could never take the words you
gave me and mold them into something
that could feed as many as you always
did. I could never take what
I was given and make it beautiful
enough for me to care as much
as you could. I could never finish
my portion of words, put them
together fashionably enough
to sell at gourmet restaurants
like stringed beans: metaphors,
similes, hyperboles, comitatus.
Do with them what you will, I'll
remain the child outside in the
sandbox, making mudpies with
my words that will always fall apart
as soon as my fingers are lifted.
Because I never saw myself as good
as the master creator you showed
yourself to be, when you gave me
the first words I ever spoke.