Take a Holiday

The christmas lights pizzicato
in the gas station window
mimic the frantic rhythm
of a Pittsburgh police car's flashers.

The cigarette ads cornered
like fugitives behind the glass
and these words begin to form
around the edges of the fear

that I have no Idea worth this effort
to shape language to reflect it.
A major premise:
All poems must convey something weighty,

something fraught with consequence,
as reflected in the distorting glass
of an Other's conjectured perception;
A minor premise:

The goings on in my mind this evening,
holiday impending, banalities encroaching,
lack gravitas and moment;
Therefore: I have no poem.

[revised, 12/22/2006]