An Endless Sestina

Freeze-Tag, Post Office, Horses – the things I used to play,
formed of my own body, their genesis in imagination.
I forged them with my friends, casting in flexible gold those games
That occupied a million summers. The swamp became a forest.
My movements, staggered through the mud, had no poetry.
I wandered alone, or guided a single friend: I needed no more community.

‘I rip your throat and kill u’ ‘U CHEATED!’ Is that what they call community?
No, Those Wolfquest WoW worlds are nowhere I could play;
Nothing that spins off of itself for me into spiraling poetry,
Nothing in filling up bars that stirs imagination:
I’d much rather lope in grey wolf shape in that forest .
I have no need for N00b-hunting games.

I freeze in terror at those games
Where I could be isolated from their Community,
Like a tree stomped out of its Forest.
I’d start it up, I’d want to Play
To see what so seizes others’ Imagination;
And I’d run and use that fear for bad Poetry.

Maybe I should just stick with Poetry
Frolic in a Frenzy, Free in Games,
Building perfect moments of Imagination.
I wouldn’t know how to really reach the Community,
But that’s fine. I know how to Play
Alone, making words to trees to Forest.

And then I find The Endless Forest:
It’s wordless. Just deer; A living painting, not poetry.
There, the players cast off words and play
Making names from symbols, miming games
That could be made. Ideally, a silent community;
Roles and genders and stories all in imagination.

And sometimes I fret, it’s too much imagination;
That there’s no want for me in this forest,
That I’m too slow for chattering community.
And then I read their comments on mine– like poetry,
And join in their parties, their now-and-again games.
Slow down a bit – I’ll try to catch up and play.

And as I play, it slams and sparks in my imagination,
Making a game of thought in the forest,
Crafting Jenga-towers of poetry, sharing it with my community.