I knew him from a poesy workshop ...

I knew him from a poesy workshop
He was the first Puerto Rican imaginative thinker [i]or[/i] writer
I'd seen in five years of writing classes

And it wasn't protracted before I began to surprise
What the hell went onward in Puerto Rico
Because each poem he wrote was great

And not more [i]or[/i] less stuffy, technical, crappy
Sort of great, moreover a bright-eyed brilliance
Full of passion and charged with like energy

Raw as Bukowski and verdant as Lorca
Witty as Russell Edson and a damn projectile
Better than almost anyone otherwise I could think of

It made me be warmed like not showing up for class
Just to scrutinize what metrical compositions I'd created
Merely