A poem for a poem

To be a poet, you need to know sadness
And pain and suffering and the madness of love
Because you can write about sorrow
Of heartfelt unrequited love
Of broken hearts, of brave heroes going to their death
You can't write about happiness or joy
because it doesn't stand the length of a poem
How can you catch a ray of moonshine
Capture it on paper and give it meaning
It is but a fleeting glimpse hiding
in the folds of dark memories of sadder things
So talk about tragedy as the greatest poems did
Tragedy of love, tragedy of bravery
Tragedy of life, Of Odeipus thrice-cursed
Was it not a poet who wrote "Better
to have loved and lost than never have loved at all"
You can make someone cry or even
Make them laugh at someone or something
But you can't make them feel happy
People who love, people who are loved
don't have poems about themselves
They are too busy being happy
So squeeze your heart for red ink
And wring out your tears on paper
Don't write about hope except as a dream
Don't write about happiness except with sarcasm
Don't write about pleasure except as a cynic
And if you do write lovely happy poems
Keep it away from the cold, cynical
sarcastic bitter world