The miserly poet

The poet who declaims his opinions
in obscurely wrought puzzles
leaves me cold.
Mental games of cleverness
proclaim hollow virtuosity and
touch nothing in me.

The meanings buried in too-clever references
and elliptical allusions are still-born,
leaving only sign posts to nowhere.

I wonder -- if I struggle to decode the signs,
will there be that flash of insight
that reveals a new world?
I puzzle and probe this tortured language,
teasing out its meaning --
but find only opinon,
dressed in obscure intellectualism.

Neither hand nor heart has been engaged
in this clever mind game.
These shuttered phrases are ungenerous --
they give little away.
Tight and miserly, they withold meaning.

This self-seeking game would matter little
if the poet was not
held up as a National Treasure.