The Art of Imitation

The children grow and grow 
and take on the countenance and face of another
picking bits and pieces of others and taping them to himself
and the women hear another speaking of art 
so they venture in circles rambling of Manet
claiming something is beautiful only by the validation of another
and then they care about the poets because someone read a poem from their mind
and they all inscribe a few phrases on the backs of their hands 
never knowing what the poet actually meant
growing and cutting their hair over and over like weeds turned to flowers than back again
the children grow and grow 
growing drunk on imitation 
and they shake my hand at graduation and say that I’m all grown
with the syntax of a declaration, but the tone of a question
and I look at the tops of my shoes 
waiting for the wind to press the gown out of the way
so I can read and then say with valiant impersonation,
Yes. 

-anna sluder

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