"Not hopeless if you are less than 21." - Ezra Pound What is the wealth of my experience? I wonder, with what speed should my heart fall, How many pieces must remain upon the floor Before my words are too bloody to ignore? Should I not have spared myself the years In peace and bliss, in that tide-pool before Love, Before the waterlogged tumult of perspective Ate away and rotted my foundation? Must I have succumbed to the sorrows and drinks At such a young age, just to quench them After heating in the bellows of craft and diction Until my words could no longer hold an edge? What a warrior, then, I would be! Call me Achilles, But pause. Rewrite the script, and ask: What would I be without adult pain, Without my Myrmidon scars and Patroclus? I do not know from where the Truth springs But from the bottom of a bottle and starless night, Though I am certain—knowing my own life— That I share this burden with you. And I shall continue to write it As beautifully as I can.