I wouldn’t mind a house
managed by servants—
an English butler
to advise me
whether to take tea in the study
or outside in the garden,
a cook whose kitchen is a temple
and whose table bears testimony
to imagination and love,
a gardener to tend the hedges
of the children’s boxwood labyrinth,
a housekeeper who brings order
to the library’s scattered books,
and most important of all,
a secretary and amanuensis,
an angel who, unseen, leaves
each morning on my desk
a ream of fresh paper
and an onyx fountain pen
beside a little silver bell
I might lift and ring
to summon all twelve muses
if that’s whom I wanted,
if I thought they ever had
something poetic to say.
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Richard Jones is the author of seven books of poems, including his most recent volume, Apropos of Nothing (Copper Canyon Press, 2006), and a forthcoming collection, The Correct Spelling & Exact Meaning (Copper Canyon, 2009). A volume of new and collected poems, The Blessing (Copper Canyon, 2000), won the Society of Midland Authors Award for poetry. A new collection, King of Hearts, is forthcoming from Adastra Press. For twenty-nine years he has been editor of the literary journal Poetry East, which celebrates poetry, translation, and art from around the world; he also edits the journal’s free poetry app, “The Poet’s Almanac.” He lives in Chicago, where he is a professor of English at DePaul University. (updated 9/2015)