JOHNMICHAEL SIMON POETRY

Sir Isaac Bubble knows
secrets that you might suppose
he only discovered
when old Mother Hubbard
threw a diphthong down onto his nose

 

The universal force he declared
is a mixture of wondrous and weird
a plateful of sandwiches
filled with tongue twisting languages
gravitating linguistics absurd

 

All spins around everything else
in a soundless concerto of bells
but with wisdom infinite
he deciphered that in it
are elevens that are larger than twelves

 

—and theories that are disproved by elves
—and words that don’t speak to themselves