Why do I hate you? Let me count the ways...

Oh I could list them.... but no - not the trivialities
that drive us into impotent blind rage
committed daily by our partners, children, (parents?) , room-mates -
I, you, we, all have that list...

but I sing the joyous list of so-called 'minor' poets
who simply spell out, so uproariously
our petty human weaknesses,
domestic inadequacies, all the idiot joy
of living together while apart...

poets who'll never be on someone else's list
of 'ground-breaking' avant-garde great names
who with new neighbourings of words and sounds
expand humanity's poetic vision of the tears of things;
map out the undiscovered mind of years that are yet to be -

no - poets who, living all our lives for us,
confirm, with smiling banal truisms, this comedy,
our shared humanity; humans being humans;
wishing that we might change, but not too soon, not yet...

and as we smile and groan as poets with their skills
list that familiar daily stress and strain -
the still, mad music of humanity -
love arises.

Michael Shepherd

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/0264-toothpaste-tubes-and-toilet-seats/