Words wax

What words wax when you're wondering wildly?
What matters the most when you're not muttering mildly?
A perfectionist poet who pops in their prime
The dopest delivery to be dropping a dime 

High score! 

Nah g, thats not gonna be how it goes
No glitz no glammer, you're just practicing prose 
Stringing some syllables so you see how they slide
Hoping for heaven for a hint that won't hide

A line from a list that won't leave you alone
The best of a batch that bites to the bone
A fantastic phrase that finds your fancy
Some sort of sound that surrounds all you can see

It is only wondering wildly that winds into such words
An absolute essential if you indulge in the absurd 
Go forth, hunter poet, better the beasts you don't know
Find fierce phrases you can thread into your flow

And don't be caught slacking and accepting your worst
Lest you be ensnared forever in conventional verse

Because the world is not static

Growing up, other countries were foreign to me
I didn't jet across the Earth on a yearly trip to ski
It wasn't the most diverse experience, growing up in York
In this sort of place, there's a shared way you tend to think and talk

And now, I am the sum of nations I've never lived in
Due to my friends who don't even realise what they're gifting
Sharing themselves in a way which now fill my memory banks
In fact, let me borrow from my American friends and give thanks

Let me start off this little exercise of a thankful ode
With my academic colleagues from all over the globe
We all learned in different classes and now come together
Making stronger ideas which are more likely to weather

Growing up, I never really had spice in any form
Truly, I was a product of where I was born
But recipes and dishes of many a wonderful taste
Have migrated worldwide right into my waist

Music and movies now no longer stop at the border
They stream into our lives and help us find order
Then there's idioms, philosophies, everything in between
So much is different for each <insert country>'s dream

The world turns. And it carries people and all their history.
For that, I am thankful. For the many things it has given to me.
Maybe, one day, I too will live outside of my birth nation.
And share a bit of all I have learned from the global migration.

The arts exist until they don't

The arts exist until they don't 
They live on open mic nights in dingy bars
In the tired hosts who have been doing it for years
In the salesman needing an escape from selling cars

The singer who is a builder in her spare time
The soloist who is trying to do art full time and figure out the finances
The venue trying to bring people out of their homes to a world of rhyme 
The arts exist until they don't

So treasure those places where art lives still 
Carry it in your hearts 
Be the echo if you will
Find places for it to start

Because we are richer with art in our lives
With the beat that can persist
It is effort needed by those who strive
My friend, let's help the arts exist