Poem of the Week: Andrew Hudgins' "The Poet Asserteth Nothing"

Get your poem on! This week we present a keeper from Andrew Hudgins, author of Ecstatic in the Poison from dear old Overlook Press. We're 35 this year you know (a Camaro is possibly on the horizon). Mark Jarman writes "Andrew Hudgins says the unsayable in his poetry and makes beauty often out of the unbeautiful." Judge for yourself: here is "The Poet Asserteth Nothing" for your enjoyment and approval:

The Poet Asserteth Nothing


The poet asserteth nothing. This elegy's
the best damn poem I've ever written. The poet
asserteth nothing and therefore it doesn't matter
my father isn't dead, or even ill.
The poet asserteth nothing and therefore
never lieth, Sir Philip Sidney wrote,
and drunk at parties I cornered nervous friends
and badgered them. Did they think poets asserteth
nothing and therefore never lieth? I knew
that I asserteth much and lieth plenty.
I think he'd like it if he ever saw it.
I knew that poets asserteth much and lieth
with everyone they could. I knew that thruth's
a lie because it can't contain this world,
the next, the truths opposing it, raw grief,
my father's death. The poet asserteth nothing
and therefore never lieth--both assertion
and lie. True lie. And death will make it truer.