It took 14 days, but of course I caved in and worked karaoke into a poem, almost as a karaoke poem (given it's taking lines directly from another poem, Amiri Baraka's "Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note.")
“Preface to a 20 Song Karaoke List”
with apologies to Amiri Baraka
Lately, I’ve become accustomed to the way
The sound wells up and surrounds me
Each time I go out to the bar
And make noises into a microphone
For some small amount of approval
Things have come to that.
And now, each night I try new songs,
And each night I do old favorites.
And when my three to five minutes are complete,
I watch others do the same thing.
Nobody sings very well.
And then last week, I tiptoed up
To a wireless microphone and hid
The thoughts of the week
In a pop song from the ‘90s
Emotions wrapped in 4/4 time, peering out at
A disinterested barroom crowd.
