A found poem (for Jim Krusoe)

Here’s a found poem, found in that I found this written in my Antioch Writers’ Workshop notebook from July 12, 2010 for my graduate school mentor, the novelist Jim Krusoe.  I wrote this almost-poem in a morning class three years ago, before I learned more about how people write poetry, but today something about it seems quaint, and worth reiterating, so I am posting it.  Bad poetry, admittedly, but its DNA is true.

Editing (for Jim Krusoe)

You said,
“Start here,”
lopping several pages
from the front of my story
like a severed limb
I had muscled
and exercised,
polished, toned.

The thing
(the now-partial body, I thought)
stood there.
I thought I saw blood–
not a Monty Python spurt,
but a trickle.

But I was wrong.
There was no blood.
It was a good cut, the right cut;
the story stood stronger
without those pages.

You were kind
and you were right.