A friend asked me
how to be a writer.
I wanted to say,
lock yourself in a room,
scream until you have
a poem and no voice.
Open your veins and bleed
until you know that your bones
are pure words and sorrow.
Act as if you slit your own throat
and all you can bleed
are your own regrets
and all of the darkness
you boxed up for inspiration.
Write your mom a letter,
tell her you're leaving
and you won't be back for awhile
Because being a writer is traveling
through all seven layers of Hell
and denying anything is wrong.
Forget loving yourself
when all you have is a pen and paper
fused to your wrist
and Jesus is tapping at your skull
saying turn back now.
Warn the neighbors that if they smell burning
It's just your soul
clawing at the front door trying to get in.
Learn how to be alone.
Learn how to lose everything you have
in order to feel release,
learn how to only feel deceased
from now on.
A friend asked me
how to be a writer.
All I said was
don't

Back to the
subtle pool
of dark and deep
that lay below illumination.

Wriggling, slippery
scales of black
in a pool
so hard to see,
so hard to grasp.

Down the hall
in the realm of control,
pulling into light a dark shadow.

Maybe two, but one.

Pull it close
to touch it in mind,
to know it and own it
and let it go.

So deep and dark
and subtle and fooling,
this pool of mind.