I wanted to hang out with the greats,
the shakers, the breakers,
the ones who would beat me toward better;
So I called L. Beethoven,
but he was occupied writing sounds
he heard we couldn’t hear,
So I called van Gogh,
but he warned me saying
if I got too close I would catch fire.
So I called J. Joyce,
but his eyes ached from writing.
He said, “ Just read the damn book.”
So I called Bob Frost,
but he said, “better be with a tree than me.”
I climbed a birch and waited for wind.
So I called Tom Eliot,
but he was wasted.
So I called P. Picasso,
but he had painted himself
into the corner of a cube.
So I called H. Matisse
but he was in the mood for color
and I was black and white.
So I called Igor Stravinsky,
but he couldn’t break his concentration.
He was attempting to write the rite right.
So I called August Rodin,
but he shouted through the bolted door,
“I’m in the cathedral of thighs.
Go away.”
So I called Emily Dickinson,
but she was secluded in her Amherst house
searching for the exactly right word.
So I called Walt Whitman,
but he was contemplating grass
and I wanted to mow.
So I called Antonio Gaudi,
but he was exhausted from building God’s
gaudy house.
So I called F. Nietzsche,
but he whispered, “I can’t talk now,
I’m attending God’s funeral.”
So I called G. Mahler,
but he was pouting in envy
of Beethoven’s more famous 5th.
So I called the Greek Euripides,
but he was hell bent out of Athens
after staging his wild women play.
He said he’d get back to me later
when things settled down.
He never did.