What the Fuck

 

I have a confession to make.

I'm not an intellectual.

I don't have a master's degree in literature.

I don't have a PhD in philosophy.

And I don't know what half the words mean

that some people use

to explain something

that wasn't all that complicated

in the first place.

But I do know something.

I know when somebody's hurting.

I know when somebody's lonely.

I know what it feels like to lose.

To love.

To fail.

To get knocked down,

and wonder if you've got enough left

to get up again.

And I know how to put those feelings

into words.

Simple words.

Words that don't require

six years of university

and a student loan

to understand.

Now, I've been told

that poetry is supposed to be sophisticated.

That it should challenge the intellect.

Explore the existential complexities

of the human condition.

What the fuck does that even mean?

Seriously.

If you have to explain your poem

for twenty minutes

after you've finished reading it,

maybe the problem

isn't the audience.

Maybe it's the poem.

Now, Ernest Hemingway

wasn't exactly a stupid man.

He wrote some pretty good books.

Won a Pulitzer.

Won a Nobel Prize.

And they say his writing

could be understood

by a kid in Grade Five.

Think about that.

A man who won the Nobel Prize

didn't need a dictionary

to make people feel something.

So here's my question.

When did being difficult to understand

become a sign of intelligence?

When did confusing people

become something to be proud of?

And when did we decide

that the bigger the word,

the bigger the brain?

Because I've met people

with three degrees

who couldn't change a flat tire.

And I've met people

who never finished high school

who could teach you more about life

over a cup of coffee

than you'd learn in a semester.

So fuck your fancy vocabulary.

And fuck the idea

that simple means stupid.

I don't want to write something

that makes you reach for a dictionary.

I want to write something

that makes you reach for a tissue.

Or laugh.

Or remember somebody you loved.

Or maybe just sit there

for a moment

and think.

Because words

aren't supposed to build walls

between people.

They're supposed to knock them down.

And if I can say something

in five ordinary words,

why would I use fifteen extraordinary ones?

Just to impress you?

I'm sixty-two years old.

I've lived.

I've loved.

I've made mistakes.

I've buried dreams.

And I've started over

more times than I care to count.

And I'll tell you something.

Life has taught me

that the smartest person in the room

isn't always the one

using the biggest words.

Sometimes...

It's the one

who knows how to make

the smallest words

mean the most.

So tonight,

if my poetry sounds like

it was written by a fifth grader...

Good.

Because I'd rather have

a fifth grader understand every word I say

than have a room full of university graduates

pretend they understood

a single fucking thing.