Paradoxes and Oxymorons (Essential Intimacy)

There is some serious business going on in this very short 4-4 line stanza poem. When I "discover" a poem like this, it reminds me of why I'm writing, so I can reach a level of concision in my own poetry that can contend with this simply complex voice of Ashberrys. The self awareness that Ashberry displays in this little piece is not uncommon to modern literature, but through a very important mixture of ambiguity and straightforwardness, Ashberry accomplishes a dialogue with the reader where the reader becomes the poem that Ashberry is writing through the act of reading it. I read this poem three times before I read it out loud and I was already slowly becoming aware of what Ashberry is saying, but when I finally read it out loud (twice) I became aware that someone else was in the room, John Ashberry, lying on the bed next to me, reading this poem out loud.