Summary

The website content is a reflective poem titled "Man’s Best Friend" accompanied by an author's note and poetic context, which explores themes of resilience, self-assurance, and the nature of poetry.

Abstract

"Man’s Best Friend" is a poem that delves into the struggle of poets and the importance of assertiveness. It suggests that poets often face criticism and must persevere through doubts and fears to succeed. The poem emphasizes that self-confidence and boldness are crucial to achieving one's goals, much like how precious metals do not easily yield. The author reveals that the inspiration for the poem came from combining three unrelated topics—precious metals, man's best friend, and poets—into a cohesive piece. The poem follows a 7–8–7–8 syllable metric and is meant to inspire fellow poets to challenge themselves creatively. The author also provides a candid explanation of the poem's context and the realities of writing poetry on Medium, where the financial return is minimal, and poets must extend their content to earn more.

Opinions

The author believes that poets often face harsh criticism from those who lack understanding or appreciation for the craft.
There is an opinion that self-doubt and fear are detrimental to one's success, and that a confident approach is essential.
The poem suggests that true success comes from assertiveness and the willingness to demand and seize opportunities.
The author notes that poetry on Medium is undervalued, leading to the necessity of additional content, such as author notes, to increase earnings from reads.
The author challenges other poets to create works using the same three disparate topics, indicating a belief in the value of creative constraints and community engagement.

POEM || POETRY

Man’s Best Friend

Surprise, surprise!

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Man’s Best Friend

Far too many poets bleed As thorny roses pay no heed. Nothing is ever enough For those who are barely enough!

If you want to win the game, It’s often good to feel no shame. Doubts and fear can’t hold no sway, A trembling hand gets slapped away!

There’s so much a man can take, For yielding strikes can never make Precious metals slutly bend; Assertiveness is man’s best friend!

Author Note

This poem was the product of a late-night flash of inspiration that came to me after I read another article by John Hansen. In his article, John wanted to see if he could successfully combine three random and seemingly unconnected topics into a single poem.

One of his friends provided him with the three topics for his random word poem: precious metals, man’s best friend, and poets.

To be honest, as soon as I looked at these words, I was like, “Bloody hell, those are totally unrelated; it’s gonna be so hard!”

Yet all it took was just one sentence to act as a foundation, and the rest of the poem went smoothly as I built around it. That’s how it is sometimes. Inspiration comes and goes as it pleases.

This poem follows the 7–8–7–8 syllable metric.

Poetic Context

The first stanza underlines that words alone, no matter how well-crafted they are, will never be enough. Ironically, those who don’t know how to put blood, sweat, and tears into something will always be the most pretentious critics.

Their hate, envy, and self-proclaimed superiority will make these people distance themselves from constructive criticism. Haters would spill venom just to ruin your confidence and drag you down to their level.

The other two stanzas highlight the importance of shamelessly following your path, no matter what others say. If you have low confidence and do not seize every chance you get, nobody will ever do you any favors.

No matter what you want to achieve, it’s better to stretch your hand and boldly make demands while courageously snatching your own success.

Instead of being jealous of others who get things done, why don’t you follow in their footsteps? Ask and you shall receive; strive and you will taste the sweet reward!

Some might say that it’s not good to explain your own poetry, that it ruins the charm. Normally, I would agree, but poetry doesn’t pay too much on Medium.

The average time it takes to read a short poem is so low that most poets barely make one cent from a complete read.

This is why some of us come up with these author notes and explanations. Extending the reading time with a bit of text will increase the profit to 3 or 5 cents per full read.

That being said, thank you for humoring me, my friends!🙏🏻

I want to share this with my fellow poets and perhaps challenge them to write a poem containing these three topics: Rena Aliston, Block Wife, Suddenly Sue, Bonnie L. Boucek, Susan Christiana, CosmicDancer, Gerald Washington, Margie Willis, Benjamin A., Nick Cuccovia, Angel Axuly, Tesie Mills, Benighted, Sameh Neseim, Jason Edmunds, Linda Cowgill, Bipolar Blonde Blogger, Garima Sharma, J. F. Alexandria, JULIAN GRACIANO NUNEZ, Bella of Thoughtsnlifeblog, René Beauchemin - [he/him], Britt H., Connie Song, MelissaWithAPen, Wayne Anderson, Ranting Goddess, Steffi Timm, Dixie Dodd, Luis Rosa, Joao Coimbra, Larisa Treacy, KAKA LAM 嘉嘉 @iamkakalamkk