A Million Little Words

Kafka wanted his words burned,
or so it is said,
Jacqueline Susann worshiped the Golden Calf,
praying she might be read.

Thomas Wolfe stampeded his words,
while Maxwell Perkins culled the herd,
Hemingway chose words carefully,
a style new, he was sure.

F. Scott Fitzgerald drank,
the Roaring Twenties in the rearview mirror,
Joan Didion looked fragile,
while aiming to perturb.

J.R.R. Tolkien wrote a tale,
that the world embraced,
he looked at his fans,
and recoiled in horror.

J.K. Rowling wrote in coffee shops,
uncertain of her future,
and became the richest woman,
in Albion of yore.

George Orwell traveled
to the future, while
Philip K. Dick's psychosis
became real.

J.D. Salinger wrote a word a year,
resting on his laurels,
while Harper Lee never
wrote another.

George R.R. Martin wrote a
million words,
but let others
finish the story.

Bestselling authors are forgotten,
Uris, Wouk, and Robbins,
other authors write more than ever,
now that they are gone.

And now a million writers,
clamor to be seen,
lost in an ocean of words,
written on machines.

Somewhere between Kafka,
and Susann, I write my little stories,
hoping someone hears them
and fearing that they will.