The sestina sestina

I am writing you a sestina.
You ask me what's a sestina.
I tell you I have written sestinas
all my life. I explain they are difficult, but I find writing sestinas
relaxing. My first sestina
was written the day my English teacher said 'Today we are writing sestinas'

and she explained what they were, that a sestina
is a rotation of words. I wrote 'sestina'
at the top of the page. I didn't finish the sestina
they're difficult, and long, so other than the word sestina
my piece of paper was blank.I found the piece of paper a few years later. 'Sestina'

I thought, and started again. This time I finished my sestina
my first sestina
a good sestina.
By Christmas I had written 20 sestinas
my favourite was the sestina
I wrote the day my grandma died. 'He's writing a sestina'

I heard my dad say in the church. People were used to it by now. 'Him and his sestinas'
they'd say, 'I don't know what he'd be without his sestinas.'
I wrote a sestina
for my first girlfriend. It was called Together Forever. The sestina
makes me look pretty stupid now. Hopefully this sestina

won't carry the same pathos. There was the sestina
I wrote when my dog ran away, the sestina
I wrote when I was shot in a driveby. That was a grim sestina
I almost didn't bother writing a sestina
that day. But there was nothing to do in the hotel. I taught the nurse about sestinas
and she helped me. I dictated. She wrote it all down for me. 'It's a sestina'

she said to all the other nurses. Soon they were all writing sestinas
and it still happens now in the ward. A special room for sestinas
to be written. Recently I showed my sestinas
to a professor, famed for his love of sestinas. I asked if he'd look at my sestinas.

These aren't sestinas' he said, looking at my collection of sestinas.
Sestina's use different words at the end of each line. Your sestinas
don't work at all.