REJECTION SLIPS

There's got to be a poem in there somewhere.  Please help me find it.  Dewell

REJECTION SLIPS

Here I stand by the mail box
ripping open rejection slips
from NEW YORKER, again.

They say they want short, skinny
poems with few words that don't
make no sense to any body.

I've got more of these slips than
Carter has seed oats or little
liver pills in Monkey Wards catalogue.

I write long, tall, walking along
poems about strolling a country road
holding hands with a dimpled,

pigtailed girl from Sunday school
skipping stones, making plans for
when we get all grown up.

Guess I'll cut one of my poems
from 250 words to 25 that even I don't
understand, post it on the back of

a rejection slip, get paid big bucks.

   -Dewell H. Byrd

Dewell

I feel your pain.  I am grateful to know I'm not alone in the poem pool.

Todd

I fear I am the author of those short skinny poems that don't make no sense to any body. 

So how come The New Yorker ain't beatin' down my door?

I think you've found the poem.  Now to find a home for it, in a publication that doesn't use poems nobody understands. 

The Phrase That Pays for me:  Monkey Wards.  If you don't do anything with this poem, you've got to use Monkey Wards again.  I hadn't heard it in years.  It set the tone, in my book.

One change I would make.  "walking along" to "walking-along".

I double-dog-dare you to pare this poem to the bone, just for fun.

It's not easy being a poet and wanting to publish.  I guess we have to match poem with journal or mag.  How do you do that?  : l   Did they really tell you they want skinny poems that make little sense or no sense?  Shocking.  Cute ending.  You are definitely speaking about rejection of good work.   We all know the sting of it.  
This is what I call a great therapeutic poem.  It helps the poet to write it. . . .then, on we go.  I think it'd be a good contest poem, Dewell.  Might try it in contests where poets will appreciate it.

Here's a NEW YORKER version of my RANT.  Dewell

Accepted For Publication

New Yorker
wants
skinny poems,
few words,
sense
not required.

I write
strolling poems,
pigtailed girls,
skipping stones.

Guess I'll
post on
back of
rejection slip
get big
bucks.

-D.H.B.

I should know better than to double-dog-dare you. 

Version II also works!