MY GOLDEN FRIEND, EMILY DICKENSON 08-05-10

I have not the metaphors, nor the similes
Lined up for the experts in a perfect row
to scrutinize, critique my work with glee,
searching to find some flaw in my flow.
Then my friend brings a light of gold.

A little blue book rests delicately
It sits on my knees beneath me
as I sit on the steps, outside in the heat.

I read, not fearful, I feel her safety.
My mind peers out, I begin to see.
Emily, Emily!  You so humble me!
To an angel, I confess my deepest need.

She conveyed to me, what frightened me
I could not escape my worn out scripture.
Now, I can perceive a bigger picture.

The world does not orbit around me.
It has never been just about me
I exist for it, when will I believe?
My insipid perception has been deadly.

When I accept this fact, I’ll be set free.
I will love me and others willingly.
I'll see the beauty above and around me.
Emily, Emily, your soul surrounds me.

For neither fame nor fortune did you begin
To put down on paper, your thoughts to your pen
You refused publicity, and your fame.
which you held with the deepest disdain
though for you, it was so honorably gained.

You graciously chose a pure heart, instead.
As I crawl into my restless bed,
I place your words beneath my head.

I always wanted to be a "Bond Woman"
The kind of woman James Bond would want
****, exciting, worldly, mysterious
Bossoms to die for
But no,
I'm a "book woman"
The kind of woman who can recite Emily Dickenson in my sleep
Reading glasses that are eternally falling off my face
Bossoms?
Not so much
When the Bond women are wet,
They look like water goddesses
I look like a drowned rat
Plus my glasses fog up
A blind, drowned rat
I think its safe to say,
I'll never be a "Bond Woman"
I'm a "Book Woman"
And I guess that's ok

Here's to all us "Book Women"

They say actions speak louder than words
but I’ve never been one for shouting
so here’s my quiet confession
only for you; my sole obsession

My mounting
                    feelings soar
                                      on this paper

My words may not roar
But rest assured
They are true.
I need no hyped up hyperbole
No profound, mind-boggling simile

no hiding
behind complex imagery

all I have are my naked words

bare, exposed emotion
unbuttoned passion
white expression
embrace this page
clinging tight.


Still
nothing I write
can ever capture this feeling
no epic, no odyssey
can chart this journey of
                flying
with you

I am not Shakespeare
Dickenson
Frost
I’m just a fool; lost
Without you

I am not trying to compose a classic
not trying to re-write the Romantics
these are my words
from heart to hart

I love you

poetry, is almost dead
it’s gasping for breath
reaching out ,tearing at the bottom of our pants
clinging to anyone it can
A  solider of culture
being dragged from the battlefield,
after an open fire attack
by generations and generations

Poetry,
words strung together with beautiful precision
feelings reveled
people laying naked
exposed
Bleeding on the stage, on the page,
on the bathroom walls at the Mall
On the subways, in the sand
even writing on their hands
trying to save

….
what’s dying

This is why we slam.
this is how we resurrect the language
energy emitting from our bones like electricity
catchy beats and in your face attitudes
give flesh to the skeletal body
of poetry

This is why we slam.
because Poe wasn’t tough enough
Keats is too old fashioned for us
and the philosophical words of Robert Frost are foreign to us.

Today he who is shunned for his talented tongue
mush break the mold,
ignore the sweet sonnet and the subtle hiku
that is
misunderstood
modern day delinquents
those too ignorant to recognize
an onslaught of alliteration
                or
a well placed metaphor
those who find poetry
a bore

This is why we slam.
let our strength ring out through our voices

This is why we slam.
we speak our truths
pick off the paint covering the ugly reality

This is why we slam.
to be heard.

When the traditional beauty of Owen, Wordsworth and Dickenson
Just won’t do
us slam poets hear the call
and we come through

This is why we slam.
To face the harsh reality that is society
to attack
the politics,
the racism
the injustices
of life itself

Fast words whizzing from our mouths
from our hearts
slamming the ****** silence
and complacency
that has become today’s reality

This is why we slam.
To be heard,
to resurrect the dying art.

This is why we slam.

I dig Joe Rogan
Suheir Hammad
And Alix Olson
Truth seeking
Artists

I dig Howard Zinn
And Noam Chomsky
Dead intellectuals
Truth seekers

I dig Marty
McConnell
And Jason Carny
Poet lovers
Of Humanity

I dig Shakespeare
Mark Twain
Edgar Allen Poe
Emily Dickenson
John Keats
Percy Shelley
Ginsburg and the other Beats
Writers and poets
I will never meet

I dig The Daily Show
The Colbert Report
The John Oliver Show
The Young Turks
News and fake news
Comedy Shows
That expose
Deep truth

I don’t dig me
Always
But I like you
And all the potential
You hold
You are not a black hole
But a blazing star
Waiting to blow
Waiting to be born
The only good form
Of a hydrogen bomb

That reminds me
I dig Einstein
Tesla, Da Vinci
Gandhi Thoreau
Bruce Lee
Great Minds
That are dead

My list goes on
Forever in my head
So instead of
A dissertation of love
I would like to know

Who do you dig bro?

Spoken word.
It ain't about
rhymes
sonnets
Shakespeare, Dickenson, or Poe.
It ain't about
the iambic pentameter flow
or the 5-7-5 of a haiku.
It's about
the heartbeat
the pulse that courses through your very soul in a rhythm that is completely
you.
It is YOU that falls from trembling lips
into the figurative and literal microphone before you;
YOU who breathes life into words that would
otherwise be considered
scribbles on a page.
It's an essence
a way of being
and beating
the drum of your being
that would otherwise have you hanging---
on tenterhooks,
waiting for permission
to raise your voice above the rest
just so you can feel
like you've got something to say.
And child,
you do.
You got a story all your own
a thunder that outnumbers
the roar of the lions that are too busy
with their 9 to 5 to stop
and listen.
So don't think you have to shout
just to be heard
but don't you whisper the words
that mean so much
but can seem so small.
They ain't.
Those words are your fists,
balled up tightly and raised high in the air
demanding the attention of anyone who will just
listen.
They strike
again and again
breaking the air and airwaves
with a newfound
beat
so don't you think
your fists are too small
to mean something
because child, they ain't.
Raise your words high
with that of your peers
and chant them again and again
like it's the last war cry that will ever
be heard
around the world
your voice is strong.
It echoes
and shakes the earth to it's very core
like a stampede
so don't you stop
don't you stay silent now
just step up to the mic like this
will be your legacy
your last words to live by
and the first words to make you
reborn.

I don’t want to live in a universe where cats are considered liquids— They’re bad enough as they are.

So some idiot decided that cats fit the definition of a liquid—
“a substance that flows freely but is of constant volume”.

Obviously the dictionary is wrong, wrong, WRONG.
I shall spend the rest of my dotage developing a definition that will not accept cats as liquids.

Perhaps “A freely flowing substance of constant volume that doesn’t meow.”— Perhaps not.

But wait,  cats don’t fit the definition after all. They don’t stay the same size, especially when frightened or wet.

I bet that idiot spends all his time watching cat videos and has never hosed down fighting cats in his backyard.

Dotage saved for more important stuff :
Continue study of Schrodinger’s aversion to cats, look for hidden messages in Emily Dickenson poems recited backwards, master fake outrage.

How infuriating, knowing
of the infinite supply of “hope”
and how it is and will continue
to be so—defying the abyss of
our debt.

Smug! That’s the word, not
what Emily Dickenson wrote
in sympathy: hope
is a thing with feathers,
is a bird’s song, Extremity.
Somehow made heroic
by abstinence from reward.

“Hope” does not hold it’s hat
out to us for crumbs and drinks;
we have already buried hope in
bread and drowned it in wine—
for with each hope that hoists us from
the depths, another lets our grip slip
off its palm greased with
false promises.

boeing 747-700x
they say that size doesn't matter
but i disagree with them
and say they're full of ****
size DOES matter
this is why i fly my jet
a boeing 747-700x
my baby is f8cking huge
a touch under 280ft long
i can carry hundreds of people
all around the world
flying in luxury in my jet
served by **** air hostesses
with bruce dickenson my co-pilot
take it from me size does matter
and yes my jet is big and black

I’m afraid to die.
There, I said it.
My greatest fear is dying.
What the hell kind of fear is that,
it’s like being afraid of a sunrise,
or of black eyes,
Something that’s gonna happen,
and something that doesn’t hurt after.
For years I convinced myself it was gonna miss me,
but this ain’t kickball, and gettin chose last is the same as gettin chose.

"I could die right now, I could die while reading this."
It’s terrifying, don’t you think, that we could die at any time?
There my heart goes on its Zanzibar drum solo.

And it’s crippling too.

Because you can’t move past that fear and do something else,
what’s the **** point of even thinking of anything?
We’re gonna die. We’re gonna die. We’re gonna die.
What should I do now?
Doesn’t matter gonna die.
What about my dream?
Doesn’t matter gonna die.
Will I be remembered…
… doesn’t matter, still gonna be dead.

It makes every other fear bearable, no, romantic.
Living alone, being unloved, being unremembered: how the hell is that scary?
Each offers insight into character, the beautiful motivation of self reliance and self understanding is what led to that deep understanding of humanity, these thoughts drove
Thoreau,
dead
Whitmen,
dead
Dickenson,
dead.
dead dead dead dead dead dead dea.
they are all dead!
and what the hell did they do to deserve it—what will I do?
Nothing.
I'm still paralyzed.

It’s a granite bench that I frequent
Your name carved in stone; eternal
It’s the ink over my ribs.
A barrier to protect our vulnerable hearts
You used to tease me for my love of symbolism
How could we have known?

I’ve been reading up on Dickenson
I’ve been keeping my room a mess
I’ve been seeing you in my dreams

I talk with you there, but I still can’t talk with you here

On this granite bench that I frequent
I kiss your name in stone; eternally it lingers for you there
The next time I return, it remains, unclaimed and cold

What was protecting your heart?
Was it that through which the bullets tore?
Two to the chest, that’s all I’ve been told.
No CPR preformed.
****** up thought, I know.

I cut my bangs after your funeral
It was a poor choice
As we both could have predicted.
You would have laughed and kissed me all the more.
They’ve grown out now

During the time it took for them to grow, I hated the sunset
How could something so beautiful exist in the same world that kicked you out so soon?
How could I find peace in that?

And, I was ****** the moment that it did
It’s not a habit that I frequent
But none the less, that night I did
How could I have known?
A symphony of blinds clacking in the wind,
A leaky air mattress’s hiss, crickets that sounded ******
And I couldn’t move
So I just listened, and composed, and
All the while you bled, your heart stopped
Your last breath

I just laid there, ******, arms spread wide, eyes fixed
Maybe like you, I suppose?
****** up thought I know.

So, I offer a kiss to your name, carved in stone
I leave it there
But I know
It will just grow cold
And my ink itches me, over my ribs, over my heart

It must be the cold

it's all I have,
not much, to you, but all
and with my heart torn asunder
I watch my life, my labour,
resting here, for you to plunder...

ravage the fields,
torch the meadows
**** the bees
and watch the clover
wither...

count not the cost
of your rapacious greed,
see only your hearts selfish need
to be the sum the total, the all.

not knowing, in your victory
you become...the pall,
that settles in the room
and stops the conversation,
like smog and a locust infestation.

this is my life, my family
and we do, what we do
to remain free of heartache
and negativity.

we need not your benediction,
or blessing of our grace.
so...you look to yours and
shut your face....


**********
napowrimo2015
promp­t : write a parody or satirical
poem...utalizing a famous poem you know


"It's all I have to bring today –
This, and my heart beside –
This, and my heart, and all the fields –
And all the meadows wide –
Be sure you count – should I forget
Some one the sum could tell –
This, and my heart, and all the Bees
Which in the Clover dwell"
**Emily Dickenson.

Miss Agnes Columbus
What are you doing?
What is your calling?
What path are you pursuing?
Your mother wants a teacher
Your father wants you married.
Poor miss Agnes Columbus
Now wonder you are harried.

Miss Agnes Columbus
What are you doing?
What is your calling?
What path are you pursuing?

Unlike famous Christopher
You don’t travel in the world.
You stay home all the time
And set your hair to curl.
You read all the magazines
And know all the styles.
What makes you happy Agnes?
What makes you smile?

Your mother wants a teacher
Your father wants you married.
Poor miss Agnes Columbus
Now wonder you are harried.

You write inside your diary
That nobody ever reads.
Your mother and your father
Doubt where it will lead.
Whoever will hire a poet,
A creator of hidden rhymes?
You are not Emily Dickenson
And this is not olden times.

Miss Agnes Columbus
What are you doing?
What is your calling?
What path are you pursuing?
Your mother wants a teacher
Your father wants you married.
Poor miss Agnes Columbus
Now wonder you you are harried.

He made me sell my books.
I wanted words - he wanted dope.
All my lovely volumes were packed
in boxes one day when I
came home from work.

He never took me anyplace.
But he took me to Powell's
to sell my Shakespeare collection,
my John Donne, all the Emily Dickenson -
and my cherished Edgar Allan Poe...
all the musty, strange old books
I had lovingly hoarded -
many first editions.

Next he took me to a used book store
where my paperbacks could be traded
for stacks of westerns he would be
too high on crank to read.

Now my books live in the closet.
Safe...hidden, like Jews in a Warsaw Ghetto,
or runaway teenage girls in abandoned buildings.

It has been five years.
Perhaps soon I will get a bookcase
and let them out to stand beside my chair.

You’d read Dickenson and glance over at my sketches in progress
Short quips about my tendency to bite my tongue as I worked
How I forget to censor the tines I mumble to myself

Are you still reading that same book?
Or have you finished it?
Placed it on your bookshelf
Next to your grandmother’s music box and jar of bottle caps?

I miss watching you read
I miss noticing you twist your hair around your fingers when the plot is stagnant
and furrow your brows when it isn’t

I had to draw your eyes because when I close mine they’re all I can see
I thought by letting them sleep between the warm pages of my notebook I could get some myself

At 3 am I scramble out of bed
Bathed in nightmares
I peek between the sheets
of pages to see if you’re still there
staring back up at me with those eyes that look like a symphony

At my local used-book store
There is a small poetry section
Filled with dusty old volumes
Of Whitman, Eliot, and Dickenson.
There are newer poets too,
Regardless, they are barely touched.

Each time I visit
The selection has not changed.
In fact, the spaces from where
I pulled my last purchases,
Nearly a month ago,
Are still there.

So is the hard-covered Frost
And the book of Yeats
I thought was a Pocket-Poets Collection.
Normally, I am searching for new-to-me poetry,
Variety to whet my palate with,
Finding various poets I have not read.

Yet this time I searched the shelves
For my new friend Carl Dennis
Who's poetry has been like Rooibos
On a cold spring day,
Warming my soul
And awakening my senses.

Yet near the spaces I left
Nearly a month ago from today,
Mr. Dennis cannot be found,
And I am faced with the same volumes
I faced a month ago, variety that
I normally look for, just not today.

Hi. My name is Michael, and if you’re reading this then please share it. On January 5th something strange happened to me. I’m not the strange type of person at all, I have a seemingly normal and average life that I’ve been living. Im single, I work a small yet suitable office job, I have a caring family, I spend my free time with friends or putting puzzles together, occasionally watching TV.. I’m sure the following details have bored you, but I’ve been urged to put down all I know.
As for what has happened.. January 5th, it was a weekday and I woke up in order to get ready for work just like I do every day. I got out of bed, brushed my hair with a comb, brushed my teeth, and put on my khakis and dress shirt.. yet when I rolled up my sleeves I saw a black dotted line over a small space on my left wrist. This was the start of these strange occurrences. The line was like sharpie, some non erasable marker that had gotten to my wrist somehow. I had no memory or clue to where it came from, yet it was there. At the time I didn’t think much of it so I went on with my day. The strangeness happened yet again the next day when I woke up.. I did the same thing as the last day, yet again when I went to roll up my sleeves I noticed the dotted line was gone.. in its place was an extremely thin scar. As soon as I touched it, just a graze from my thumb, it hurt.. the scar had me extremely concerned but what was even more concerning was the fact that it hurt! I convinced myself so eagerly it was ok! Its fine.. I just.. I didn’t know where the scar had came from! I still don’t! It baffles me and I think about it so so often.. anyways. I was convinced it was a weird sprain, so I made a small brace out of some bandage and I decided to head to work, arriving late which was terrible on my average record. I couldn’t even begin to think that day, it was as if my mind was fogged with questions, theories, concerns and what to do? Who gets into a situation like this? Yet again, I convinced myself it wasn’t as bad as I was making it out to be..
Then I went home, I went to bed and woke up the next day. I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t breath when I saw how bad of shape my wrist was, it was painted with black and blue and looked sickly.. I was so distraught, I yelped in my one person apartment before I cried. Never had I been more scared for what had happened to me! Until of course.. I noticed the dotted lines on my right wrist. That was what killed me. I felt like I was going insane, I couldn’t think for atleast half an hour as I was practically paralyzed with fear of what was happening! I didn’t want to be without two working hands..
So with my right hand still working I left to the hospital, I drove fast, as fast as I could while shaking.. I swear the doctors thought I was there for mental treatment when I first approached then blabbering on how something was coming to scar my wrist, on how I needed the line removed.. yet I was calmed as they took me to get an xray of my worse wrist. They kept me in a room afterwards, I waited 3 hours before a shy doctor came in slowly.. he seemed distraught, which didn’t help my situation at all. “Mr. Dickenson…” he said softly, as if trying to calm me before revealing the neighbor ran over my cat, or my mom couldn’t get me that new console.. “I’m sorry to say this, but from the xrays we have it appears that there is excess blood in your wrist from.. well.. one of the bones in your wrist is.. gone.” He said calmly, my stomach dropped and my eyes widened. What the hell? How the hell? I laughed at first as he showed me the xrays before I explained to him dreadfully how it had to have happened. It HAD to have been in my sleep! The lines!! I didn’t understand. He agreed he would keep me for the next few nights to assess my situation. I was lucky that he was as baffled as me..
So I spent my night in the hospital, and as it can be assumed.. there was indeed a scar on my right wrist, and my left had only been getting worse, more painful, more bruised.. I cried as I saw my situation, something had stolen parts of me.. hell I cant even move my right wrist.. I’ve been painfully jotting this all down with a faulty left wrist, that feels like mush where my bone was stolen. I woke up crying as the doctor came in to take me to get more xrays.. three bones from my right wrist had been stolen. The funny thing? I was in the hospital all night. Me and this doctor checked everything to find any forced entries, we checked security cameras to find nothing had been on them.. I don’t know what this is, this ghost, or disease, or hell whatever is happening to me!! What I know is that I’ve checked my body, again, and tomorrow I will die.. these rotten lines made their mark right where the doctor had said my heart is. He checked and as of now it’s still beating.. I’ve called my parents and friends, and sadly they don’t believe me much. Who would? Without proof like the doctor has I sound insane. I’m writing this because maybe you can escape it. Maybe you’ll be able to seek help when you first see the lines.. because I’ve read stories like this. These ghosts. These demons.. these diseases… they never stop after patient zero. Check your wrists before you go to bed tonight, and when you wake up. I would hate to have someone miss a sign.
I’m in watch now. They have cameras in my hospital room to try and catch it better this time. I’ll continue this if I don’t die tonight.
(Last entry, January 8th)

take an itch, wait
scratch it,
did the itch ax fo d scritch or was that

you

voice in the head of the ehearer

radio, maybe so
maybe so
Frank Zappa, or
Emily Dickenson
or Suzie Creamcheese,

only her words reamain, yet
remain
mainly in my head a phrase

it seems, a phase shift
maybe so

electric trickery, I don't know

can you hear me now, is there reason?
is reason being
reasoned with?

Are we, reasoning together,
and you know not
is it me, it is

maybe so. May is thy word,
in this phase of
your moon

fuzzy light croissant logo,
Batman or is that a cross, and a rho?
Chi Rho praxis nexus Latin lying
demnation time wastin'

funny books, retelling stories
as if it's true, as if
I heard it, I told it, as I read it,
believing every word.

Classic Illustrated.

What good does that do you?
I confess,
Professor, I don't know

if, right or wrong, ification is
done by me or mere
fictional
May, the power, given a go.
I could say. May is my word, now.

May my best wish be,
the quest is,
good beyond reason,
doing that phase shift

electional trick to May,
seasonal reason
for unbridled joy.

Tending, pretending, trending
means more to AI than I.
May I make the difference?
Say I may.
May is your word now.

How I enjoy these lost late nights playing poet under moonlight.
Each word a celebration of my wit and confusion. I am blessed by the fathers and mothers of my youth whom all knew as poets to, from Dickenson on to Poe that shaped my love and helped me grow. This is as it always was a written remembrance in love. To every poem and every story thank you for your radiant glory.

-2011

My country is a place where the
Great are small and the small are
Great.  It is mostly what I gained
By experience  and a little of what
I learned about from afar.  In my
Land the greatest man is  my Dad
Dad and the most loved people are
Those I have personally known.  I
Forgive them first and last for never
Having been recognized as saints.
None to my knowledge has ever held
Political office.  I have never shaken a
"Great" man's hand.  I feel I am no less
For all the stars being faraway.  I would
Not have it any other way.  My country
Is not an abstract place.  It is a known-
Remembered place.  It does not ask me
To shed another's blood nor my own as
Proof that I am patriotic nor to obey the
President or a general who says he knows
What is right and I should do to be free.
I voluntarily give my love-not my blood
My country is a fresh green place that is
Full of Gods perfume from the flowered
Meadows where the river valleys meet a
Sunlit morning sea where I first met all
And the great stars never spoke  but to
Wish us all well because He is kind and
Most heavenly is this my Fatherland.  In
My country where he has hidden charity.



I  believe it was Abraham Lincoln who said: If God
Did not love the common man why did he make so
Many of them

...Are you nobody too?  Emily Dickenson


There are no common people-just people and
maybe some a little less just. but who am I to
Judge?
.

I look down at the blank paper and wish the pen to write. In frustration I lay my head in my hands. Slowly I fade into sleep only to be awakened by the sound of music. I turn around to see a man playing a lyre as another paces back and forth. Puzzled for a moment ,I look around the room. From one corner I see people who are vaguely familiar. My eyes return to the person Playing the music and suddenly I know it is David, while pacing next to him I see Aerostotil. Over at a simple wooden, table I recognize Shakespear chatting with a brash fellow I know to be Mark Twain. In confusion I stumble into Lord Byron, who is reading work just written by Dickenson, she sits in a chair idly brooding waiting for him to declare what he thinks. In a Mad Dash of confusion I quickly turn around, and I fall as the house of Usher's and come crashing to the ground. A well-dressed gentleman offers me a hand and picks me up, he has a dark and piercing stare. I ask where I am, and Mister Poe quietly declares, you're in the poet's room. You have found your way here, I asked him how and he says I'm truly not sure. He says this is a place where people come to share ideas and to watch one another's work. I say that I was frustrated and could not will my pen to write. He laughs rather smugly with an impish Delight. He said that is not the purpose of writing, he says you cannot will it to flow. He says look around you and tell me what you see. I said I see great writers, but he said they can be just as frustrated as you. He said Each one can tell a story, and he said that something that you must learn to do. So the room again to fade into a fuzzy Hayes. I woke up from my slumber and look down at the blank and dismal page. It suddenly dawned on me, but I must look around. For if I want to tell a story, then it must be found. So I got it for my table and took a walk outside. There I took a really good look at the World Grand and wide. I didn't set off on a journey with the lessons that I've learned. A story can't be forced, it must be earned. So when I return to my desk, with paper and Pen in Hand. I shall no longer be so frustrated for now I understand.

I did my best to hold back. I did it for
you. I wouldn't retract. But you see,
I'm making up for lost time -
since you've left me I had a lot
going on in my mind. I thought of you
every night. And last night I dreamt
of kissing you, though I know that doesn't
sound right. But there was something
there before you left that kept you
tightly woven between my breast -
maybe it was a sign of hope -
since I can't get back what I lost,
what a dope! And one could say that
it's the ***** in these words. But I've
only a few sips, and haven't touched
the cherries yet that have sunk like my heart
to the bottom of my glass. And the editor said
I sound like Bukowski, which is a far cry
from the Dickenson that you read. Oh,
and did I tell you that my *** is sore
and bleeds? Oh, no more, no more -
those are just promises. And my fingers
are crossed behind my back -
so it doesn't count. And what I lack
I make for in provisions. Don't you love
a smart-***!

Shattering Writer’s Block
As I crusade a case of writer’s block
My mind seems to oscillate
Between ideas round the clock  
Each paper that I crumple into the trash
Seems to tease and taunt me
As a sarcastic backlash
  I’ve lost track of the poems I written this hour
My emotions are jaded
And I’ve lost my brainpower
I cannot compose a single idea or thought
I don’t have a clue
For a theme or a plot
As desperate times call for desperate measures
I dive within anthologies
For eminent poetry treasures
I think of the great ones like Dickenson and Poe
Did they ever have trouble
To make the words flow?
How about Maya Angelou or Langston Hughes
Were they ever caught up
With writers’ blues?
Did Shakespeare or Silverstein ******* as poets
How did they ever make it through
As literary ‘know its’?
And then the light bulb of realization hits me…
Poetry does not flow from the hand or the pen
It’s insightful and enlightening
Like a doctrine of zen
So Frost and Tennyson must have known
That poetry emanates
From your very backbone
The idea of writer’s block is just a façade
A blind image of reality
That is nothing but flawed!

Poetry by Sudha
April 9, 2019