Lately, I've been afraid to sleep.
Every time I start to dream,
I'm greeted by a banshee scream.
I find myself running but don't seem to go anywhere.
It feels like I'm on a set of m.c. escher stairs.
Eventually, I end up stumbling and fall.
And when I look up, I see the scariest thing of all.
She showed me a vision of a wall.
Engraved in the stones were all of the words I had been dying to say.
I thought I lost them.
But there they were just a few feet away.
The banshee screamed again and the ground started to shake.
The wall started to crumble and I knew I needed to fight. There was too much at stake.
I closed my eyes and focused on trying to breathe.
Then I started to believe.
I believed in myself.
That I'd find the words again.
And just like that, when I woke up, I found them right where they should have been.
Bottom line, don't be afraid to dream. Because eventually, you will realize everything is not what it seems.

Hindsight 20/20
Writer's block
My glass is empty!

Creative process
Transparently fragile
Must find my muse!
Must be mentally agile!

Struggling through
But no inspiration
Need some relief
From brain constipation

Finally!
Oh, what a thrill!
My muse returns
My glass starts to fill!

From immovable object
To unstoppable force
Manipulate physics?
My muse can of course!

My glass is now full
I've just posted my poem
Alas, glass now empty
My muse loves to roam


© 2020 by Mark Toney.  All rights reserved.

No words come to mind,
None spin through my head.
Their sparking shine
Has turned to a dull sheen,
And I cannot form a line.

I am left inside of this slump,
And my mind cannot think,
So now it cannot gaze
Or even drink
The wine of my knowledge.

I don't write anything
Unless I have to
And even then I hold myself to ridiculous standards
Every word must be an opus
Every line must touch some place deep
My mind falters at every step
******* journal entries are written for an invisible eye
Nothing is enough for human consumption
Not this
Not anything after
It all melts in my hand
And seeps back into my body
Words never said
Dissociation is veiled upon
A vacant face and body
Waiting to be revived

I used to write to inspire.
To let other knows what I was feeling by painting scenic views with my words
So that they'd know they weren't alone
So they'd know that no matter what happens,
Someone else is alongside them
Even if it was some stranger way out in the big wide open world

But now I feel alone

Which doesn't make any sense because I have a family that I hand-picked,
And am almost never actually alone

And also doesn't make sense because I still write
Which, one would assume means I've encountered a solution to this issue

But the writing doesn't help
And the cigarettes stopped working
So I'm stuck

And the thing is, I keep reading and rereading my old works
And none of it actually helps

Even when I distance myself from the piece and read it from a new perspective I end up getting the question I can't answer:
Why the **** does it matter if we experience the same or even similar pains?
Who am I, to think my experiences are worthy or even meaningful enough to share and spread like a virus?

So why do I write?

I'm just some guy on the internet
A shitposter trying to squeeze some semblance of a serious tone from the internet
A mind screaming to have some form of deep, meaningful conversation with anyone
When in reality that doesn't matter to anyone
Because life has squeezed sentiment until it became a pebble being kicked on the park sidewalk

So why pick up a pen to write to a world that no longer remembers how to read?

It makes about as much sense as

Well anything really

Maybe that vague understanding of nothing making sense ever is my reason

Maybe I don't really need a reason to express myself

But *******, would it be nice