I'm just going to start writing because
it's been so ****  long.
It's January and 70 degrees,
which is strangely beautiful,
something to which I can relate.

I wonder whether you can consider yourself
writer's blocked
if you haven't even tried to tumble the blocks over.

I'm not really sure why I stopped writing
or when exactly.
Maybe it's because I fell in love and found happiness.
Or maybe it's because I didn't want to
write out admissions that a perfect relationship doesn't exist.
Or, better yet, that even at my happiest,
my most in love,
there's still so much untouched darkness within me,
darkness that writing pretty words can't even make pretty
in the melancholic sort of way.

Maybe I haven't wanted to write because it's painful.
I can fake the lightness when I bury
myself
in  the world around me.
Saving problems for everyone else keeps me
from having to admit my own.

Maybe I've been blocking myself
from myself,
like if I go too deep,
peel enough back,
I may not like what I see.
Maybe I'll realize
I've been the one to blame all along.

If I write,
if words spill onto crisp white pages,
if ink bleeds from the tips of weathered hotel room pens,
if I release thoughts and feelings frozen
beneath strategically built, icy castles,
if I let go,
I may burst open too wide
and feel too much
and relive it all.

Even my newer, shinier,
stronger self
might not withstand
the force of that.

Perhaps I'll open the gate
and pray the reinforcements hold.