Free Verse

On Saturday I read “The Age”
And open to the lit’ry page.
I’m disappointed every time,
The bloody poem doesn’t rhyme.

It is the modern way I’m told,
But this free verse just leaves me cold.
Poetry? It’s more like treason,
Free alright, of rhyme and reason.

To me what sets free verse apart
Is much the same in modern art,
Whatever it was meant to mean
Will not by you or me be seen.

It’s difficult to be enthused
When something leaves one so confused.
If that’s its aim then I concede
In this at least, it does succeed.

But overlook the tell-tale signs
By reading in between the lines,
I think you’ll find what you’ll expose,
Is little more than clever prose.

Some say this rhyming stuff is trite,
But when in public I recite
A verse which makes its listeners smile,
They soon forgive its lack of style.

To those of you who take offence
At humour made at your expense,
I’ll tell you now you needn’t fret,
I haven’t got it published yet.

The publishers reject my stuff.
They reckon it won’t sell enough.
The only verse that sells is “free”.
I guess that means the joke’s on me.

The fact is, Henry Lawson sells,
And clearly this to me dispels
The generally accepted claim
That there’s no money on this game.

So throwing caution to the breeze,
The publishers can keep their fees,
I’ll get my book upon the shelf
And keep their margin for myself.

Let’s give free verse the royal shove
And thank the good Lord up above
That poets of old Henry’s times,
Wrote poetry that bloody rhymes.

© Copyright Greg Shalless – 1989