Ben John Smith

Big Shot

I spent 5 years
submitting
to every petty poetry rag
under the sun

Every online
wank fest you could
imagine

I groveled,

Sucked dick
for mic time,

Read to rooms
with an audience of
two

(Them two people
were other feature poets
waiting to read their shit)

I begged my friends to come
to my shows

I self published

I rotted my
bones with
a desperate
ink.

Then

After a few good years
being published
interviewed
and
getting paid

People
started to hassle me
for poems