Why do poets smoke cigarettes? Let me remind you one forgets Poets get nervous in service To the universe and sometimes As it gets better it gets worse Reflected in meters and rhymes And a certain uncertainty Given our sensitivity The insistence our art deserves Existence can get on our nerves Bad habits at the coffeehouse Sad rabbits mad about a mouse And crazy people everywhere With here and there a cancer scare Why anyone do anything? Because of love we poets sing For love a madman love a fool And nervous as I light this Kool In service to the universe To better spark the dark for worse May be on the way anyway So all I can think of to say Is we do what we can to be Some more like not to be though we Poets know it but come what may Speaking self-evidentially Writing self-referentially Poets smoke existentially +Steven Curtis Lance Copyright MMXIII