Jamey Boelhower
Hastings, MN
To Write To Live 4ever
Poem, 2026
April 21 2016
You sang that it sometimes snows in
April. Did you know we would feel
that cold the day you died? The wheels
sent red corvettes into tailspins.
A violent purple rain stained our skin.
We did not care if the thieves stole
all the diamonds and pearls. Our souls
lost in chaos and disorder,
remembering tape recorders,
mixtapes, and when our life was whole.
To Write To Live 4ever
I always give in when
the muse calls. Half
asleep or stuck in a
checkout line. The chance
that I will finally write the poem is
a siren call. I give all
I have to the muse. I
am a puppet. But the strings get
tangled up in knots if
I force my will onto the page. I
end up bruised and all I get
is a promise that someday a
line, a word, will be the chance
to live forever as a poet. To be at
the table, words known by all.
Jamey Boelhower is a poet and independent author with numerous published works to his name. Jamey's most recent works include Life in Poetic Form, While Death Waits, April 2020: A Poetic Time Capsule of Writing and Living During a Pandemic, and These Words Believe in Ghosts. As a loving husband and father of six, Jamey enjoys spending his free time with his family and listening to Prince. I keep the ticket stub from the 1997 Prince concert in Omaha in my wallet.
April 21, 2016, was written in a classical poetic form, Decima, for the Poetry a Day challenge during April, which is the National Poetry month. “To Write, To Live 4ever” is a Golden Shovel and the last word of each line is a lyric from Prince's song "The Max". The poem is about how I handle being inspired to write and how our art lets us live forever.
Photo credits
- Artwork images courtesy of the contributors. All rights reserved.
