Thank God for Qatar,
where I am free of tyranny,
of being yoked
to that other
(I’d rather not mention her name)
letter, always forced to follow
wherever she decides
like the coal car
yoked to a engine.
How wonderful
to be in charge for once,
not quiet
nor silent,
or having to settle
for some quid pro quo.
Essential, myself
never the sine qua non,
forgoing a quadrumvirate
resisting the quadrille,
living in any damn quadrant
I please. Heading off on my own,
wandering where I will
carrying my identity,
like a passport,
owning my own sound,
until crossing all the way
to Rubicon.
Richard Luftig is a recipient of the Cincinnati Post-Corbett Foundation Award for Literature and a semi-finalist for the Emily Dickinson Society Award. His poems have appeared in numerous literary journals in the United States, and internationally in Japan, Canada, Australia, Europe, Thailand, Hong Kong and India. One of his published poems was nominated for the 2012 Pushcart Poetry Prize.
