I'm at war with the verses lying inside my head,
Should I have been a doctor or plumber instead?
Some other job to be content and productive,
And not chained to this verse, this lyric destructive.

If words can be weapons and a lyric hold power,
Then I grow more dangerous hour by hour.
Slave to the adjective, linked to the verb,
Trapped by each subtle nuance I observe.

A wellspring of discontent, driven by rage,
My life, my heart bleeds out on to the page.
It's not simple grammar but linguistic frustration,
That lends itself perfectly to my situation.

See now my soul spread out on the paper,
A storm of calamity that won't seem to taper.
I am the victim of an invisible crime,
Entrapped by a pattern, a rhythm, a rhyme.

Trying, but failing, I can't even think,
Stuck in this ******* at the whim of the ink.
Now see the other side to the life of a poet,
I am without direction or control and I show it.

Laid upon the sheets, my struggle abounds.
I want quiet right now but I hear deafening sounds!
I cannot get out of this word laden den.
This is my sentence, a life in the pen.