Midweek Poetry: Pronomen

Who are they? Don’t trust
precious pronouns,
dark subs of uncertainty,
misleading indefinite expletives
creating confusing conversations,
reflexively relative to that which was.

First-person personal,
possessively mine, ours, or theirs.
It and there might fit
some distant noun.
Unknowns
like they who say (whoever they are),
demanding demonstrative determiners
representing this noun,
but not that clown.

They don’t know who, which, whose,
nor by whom it was.
Ownership for
he, she, or it is about his, hers, or its?
It’s blurringly written minus possessive
nouns with apostrophes of distinction.

Confusion grows unless deictic
takes over this, that, these, and those.

Not me is perpetually guilty.
Definitely, universal indefinites, like everybody
or nobody are unhelpful.
Neither King nor I may trust pronouns, but
we all sure as hell need pronouns them.


Look both ways for clarity and understanding. Mind the gaps, so they say.

6 thoughts on “Midweek Poetry: Pronomen

  1. It has become such a headache, hasn’t it? People who were “she” or he all her/his life are now officially “they”… wtf? And the ones who are the most adamant about this are not even the ones transitioning from one to the other… hidden eyeroll over here…

    Liked by 1 person

  2. I dunno. I don’t think it’s too much to ask. Yes, it can be confusing, but shifts in society and cultural change take time. Language is forever evolving, often faster than most of us. Your poem is evidence of that.

    Liked by 2 people

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