When I Dash Off a Poem
I throw down the ballpoint and say,
Take that!
You ignorant unaware world,
you thought you were complete
but I have added to you.
I have done my insolent dance
around your flaccid sombrero.
I snap my fingers over my shoulder and say
Take that, you who thought we were done.
Horses Work Hard
they clamp their bits in the riding ring
kicking the sawdust behind them
all day the children mount and pace
and when the animals rest
steam rises from their bodies like prayer
and they turn their heads and snort
when the last class is over and the girls ride
home in silence in their vans
the horses are let out
to find solace in the grass
Mike Finley, a/k/a Big Vanilla, has been writing and performing for the Twin Cities scene for almost 50 years. He has authored over 200 books and published in places as unlikely as Rolling Stone, Paris Review, and Billy Graham's Guideposts. One critic wrote of Mike: "In no one else's work, except Vallejo's, do I sense such desire straining at the limits of words."