What makes a piece of writing a poem?

If there isn't any rhyme

or at least repeating rhythm

it's just pretentious shredded prose

and not a proper poem

 'No-one but a blockhead ever wrote except for money'

                                                             Samuel Johnson

OK, so I'm a blockhead.

Cheap Playlist

The DJ danced

as if entranced

by the music that he'd played.

The people stood

as if of wood

regretting the money they'd paid.

I waited at the crossing for

the cars to stop and lights to change

but facing me they'd wait no more

to pass across and extend their range.

One after another, then twos then fours

past the red light they surged ahead,

unstoppable, ignoring the laws -

one hundred frigate birds overhead.

Tweets 21

The torment of a man's old age:  young women

Avenida Vieira Souto

--------------------------

It's hard to judge quite which is best

of parading male and female breast -

the boobs on the birds

or the pecs on the geeks.

RANKINGS

----------------

The song before the singer.

The poem over the poet.

The art above the artist.

it's hard getting up

from bathing in the warmth

of the winter bedclothes

Forget souls; try sufaces

Personalities are surfaces with idiosyncrasies,

not smooth but covered in bumps and dips,

snags and dents, scars and scratches;

too smooth and they just slide past each other

but sometimes the imperfections don't miss

but catch one another, so to speak - kiss,

and then each surface has another that matches.

TRICK OR TREAT

Past his youth and seemingly a lifelong bachelor

to everyone's surprise he suddenly had a ladyfriend.

No-one knew her or where he'd met her and he did not explain

but she was passably attractive and clearly younger than him.

He stopped his usual meetings with us, presumably besotted.

We learned about the marriage only after the event.

and  no more news until we heard that he'd become a dad

and nothing more for a year or so until we learned the sad

rumours of a very acrimonious divorce.

Of late he's started to rejoin his previous group of friends

but won't discuss his family and any mention offends.

He's very well off and I'm sure he can afford the maintenance

but I sometimes wonder how he views the whole experience.