Improvisation on a few lines by Mark Strand

" Ink runs from the corners of my mouth. There is no happiness like mine. I have been eating poetry."

I am tripping on poetry.

Purple ink drips from my eyes like ergot of rye.

I ate the work of Edgar Alan Poe but it was a bottle of laudanum.

I wear the Masque of the Red Death yet he knows who I am.

Deep inside the Cask of Amontillado I meet Lewis Carroll.

I smoke him like a hookah.

Outside on the vast stone steps

An enormous Caterpillar in a frockcoat hands me a library card.

I eat it but I'm not frightened.

I write a poem that does not rhyme.

I eat it but I'm not frightened.

An enormous Caterpillar in a frockcoat hands me a library card.

Outside on the vast stone steps

I smoke him like a hookah.

Deep inside the Cask of Amontillado I meet Lewis Carroll.

I wear the Masque of the Red Death yet he knows who I am.

I ate the work of Edgar Alan Poe but it was a bottle of laudanum.

Purple ink drips from my eyes like ergot of rye.

I am tripping on poetry.