Regarding My Role in Poetry

It’s all make-believe, I assure you.
From the gut? No, that’s not poetry,
that’s bile.
From the heart?
My heart’s a two-lane highway for blood,
nothing more.

I invent people
and I throw them into
made-up situations.
It’s my head that’s doing it.
It gets no kudos
but it doesn’t complain.

I hear it all the time:
how excruciating that must
have been for you—
your honesty is estimable—
I’m surprised you can
bear to dip one toe in the
Atlantic Ocean ever again.

Meanwhile,
I write this thing
about a kid who falls
into a threshing machine.

Do you miss him?
I hear from someone.
They don’t get it.
It’s not a real kid.
But I’m definitely the blade.