To Be a Poet

How or why I became a poet, I don’t really know.
First it was a silly question: Could I write a poem?
I did. It was nothing special. 
  
Then the challenge became to write a good one. 
That has been my life,
mostly after work at night, also on weekends.

Then a few of my poems were published, 
thanks to my wife.
(It was something I hadn’t courage to try.)
And, then, 70 to 80 were published 
in the Sixties and Seventies, mostly in small magazines.

And that’s the way it happened.
I was led to know by forces, inside and out, 
who I am at my deepest core.

Writing poetry, I am most myself. 
That much I know. But can I explain it? I cannot.
It’s who I am… but not how I made my living, 
though I loved that too. 

I truly came alive when I retired.
I am happy now, in a way I have never been.
It’s like living daily in sin. A sort of orgy. 
I generally write every day.

And I’m proud to be a poet, 
naturally, I think, 
good enough to be proud of my work,

to the point of being astonished 
at what I write,
being able to simply let go and let words flow
without even knowing where they come from
or where they’ll go.  

How lucky can a poet get?  To be so happy!
And that with no acclaim!