I Done Gone

July 25, 2025

Explain this to me. No, never mind. You can’t explain it.

Cone rhymes with bone and tone.

Done rhymes with none and one.

Gone does not rhyme with any of the above.

They all end with the same last three letters, yet there are three different pronunciations. What’s a poet to do?

At first glance, these words seem obviously part of the same family, but I guess “you can’t tell a book by its cover.”

Misfits, a poem

Done, none, less than I should be.

You can’t really tell by first glance.

Gone, gone, ignored from now on,

Categorized. Not a chance.

Not none. One. A person with worth.

You haven’t gotten to know me.

You may know my family, you may know my birth.

I’m a brand new branch on the tree.

You give me some slack, a slight nod,

You say I could turn out some better.

I sand, I hone on a grinding stone.

Still, my name remains the same letters.

There is a new life, not bound by your eyes

Or your memory of where I am from.

I can be born again, not saddled by sin,

Not stuck, but with sudden aplomb.

God is the maker of all, I have found.

The world is so obviously planned.

Am I a square peg in a hole that is round?

Not now. I’m a whole other brand.