My Personality

I should remake my personality —
I'm difficult and prickly, and sometimes
My attitude rings false; it rarely chimes
With what I think my friends demand of me:
Great love, delighting in their company.
They say my heart is with nickels and dimes,
That I'm too focused on my selfish rhymes,
And I have treated them discourteously.

But they are all my joy. I don't regret
The time we spend together, as I do
The hours I give to poetry. I'm through,
I tell myself, I'll stop. I owe no debt
To sonnets. Heart and mind are overset;
I've felt this way since I was twenty-two.

Spun

Don't sever all your ties to everyone,
Remembering the dogs who chose your scent
And left mementos at the monument
Of who they were and everything they'd done.
We took a moment in the midday sun
To think of heroes and the indigent,
Mad dogs, sane frogs, and all the badly bent,
Comparing them to us. I wove, you spun.

You spun, I danced the most appalling waltz,
Not counting as I ought to (one two three),
Exhibiting those moves, unique to me,
Reminding you of dogs. My many faults
Include dusting French fries with Epsom salts,
Displaying pride, and flouting history.