#MIDDLEBURY
Ars Poetica
Leslie McGrath
To have
even a
lotto chance
of getting
somewhere
within yourself
you don’t quite know
but feel
To cling
to the periphery
through the constant
gyroscopic
re-drawing of its
provinces
To make
what Makers make
you must set aside
certainty
Leave it
a lumpy backpack
by the ticket window
at the station
Let the gentleman
in pleated khakis
pressed for time
claim it
The certainty
not the poem.
About this poem
“I wrote ‘Ars Poetica’ with my students in mind, nudging them away from pursuing a poem as a goal, encouraging them to be more comfortable with uncertainty.” – Leslie McGrath
About Leslie McGrath
Leslie McGrath is the author of “Out from the Pleiades: A Picaresque Novella in Verse” (Jaded Ibis Press, 2014). She teaches at Central Connecticut State University and lives in Essex, Conn.
The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience. Email The Academy at poem-a-day@poets.org.
(c) 2016 Leslie McGrath. Originally published in Poem-a-Day, www.poets.org. Distributed by King Features Syndicate.
