I think I'm running out of things to confess.

I drink a lot of skimmed milk.
I use Lysol Spray in the bathroom.
I stare long and hard at pretty faces.
I'm afraid to ask for the real price of my work.
I write poems, high, after midnight, well after.

I stay home alone on Saturday nights.
I have laid in a good supply of Tucks.
I've gotten fat to ward off AIDS.
I've used diet pills to help me work--and think.
I don't exercise anymore, except coming up the stairs.

I was bored by A Clockwork Orange, the movie.
I pore over the National Enquirer.
I've read about 30 pages of Proust's novel(s).
I like Peggy Lee better than Ella Fitzgerald.
Doesn't that say something about me?

My parlor palm is dying, frond by yellowing frond.
I think I'm running out of things to confess.
I'm no Augustine, or even Christina Crawford.
I usually feel like an ass-hole.
I say "Hi, guys!" to dogs tethered on the street.

I write art criticism faster than I can read it.
I don't always enjoy Henry James.
Maybe Geraldine Page is my favorite movie star,
If I could just think of a few movies she starred in.
I hope I am very ambitious.

[Gerrit Henry, 'The Confessions of Gerrit', from The Best American Poetry 1988]