It seems to me 
that we are always writing for each other, 
not for the planet, 
not for the lost adolescents 
with their skinny waists 
and falling down jeans 
not for the children who die daily 
because there is no food 
or the medicine is only 
for the superrich, 
not for the tired homemakers 
at the nursing homes where our aging 
are thrown away to wait for death 
but for each other, the Bills, Harriets, 
Valerias, Stephens, the academics, 
award bestowers, granters of praise 
or lambast, it seems to me 
we make little difference 
to the rhythms of the planet 
because we tell the same same 
tired tale 
a slightly different 
emaciated verse 
despoiled of sentiment 
or needless artifice 
except the ones 
we each require 
of the other. 

 published in Junket