The Spotless Page
There’s a nagging need to write
That lurks within us, don’t you think ?
For the page is far too white
Until we stain it with our ink.
But more these days, I find
I tend to leave my paper bare –
Yes, their emptiness can blind,
But I prefer to simply stare.
There’s a nagging need to write,
And so I shall, some day, engage –
When my mind’s as crisp and bright,
And overspilling on the page.
There Are Only So Many Words
I used to sometimes find
That the words had run away –
I didn’t really mind, though,
As inspirations come and go,
For always I would know,
That I’d soon have something new to say.
But these days, I’m less sure
If I’ll get them back agen –
I’ve written so much more, now,
I’ve said my piece, I’ve made my vow –
So should I take a bow
And for once and all retire my pen ?
But that leads to regret
When I know I’ve words within.
At least, I hope I get to write
Some who-knows-what by inner-light
I can’t give up the fight
Until I’m sure I cannot win.
But if not now, then one day,
I really shall run dry.
When I can no more stay the course,
When I have drained away my source.
When I have spent my force,
Then I guess it’s time to say goodbye.
I know they say my words will die away –
Too true, I bet –
But not today, oh Muse – not yet !
Dear Diary
A page-a-day, with which to write my thoughts,
As the years go by –
Their private tales of woulds and shan’ts and oughts,
And not one lie.
And so I’d keep them diligently busy,
Never shy,
For a week at least, before they’d miss me,
As my pen ran dry.
And ev’ry year would bring another one,
With best intents,
With the year emblazoned on its cover,
Thirsty for events.
They always were a vaguely dreaded gift,
Yet so we’ll-meant –
And there they’d sit, unopened and unlived,
Their spines unbent.
A page-a-day with which to prove my worth,
That I exist,
And yet, my words were in perpetual dearth –
You get the gist.
I guess I’m not an introspective sage,
Nor an egotist,
Who feels the need to tell-all to the page
And mill the grist.
Yet, ev’ry year would bring the doubt unwilled,
That if I tried
To fill those pages, they would not be filled,
Unless I lied…
But if I left them virgin, who’s to say
What tales I hide ?
If only I had written-up each day,
I’d say with pride…
Winter Lows
Ev’ry time the waves of tired
Leave me drained and uninspired,
The nagging fear I just can’t shake
Is will I ever get to feel awake ?
Ev’ry time a freeze sets in,
I shiver in my fragile skin,
And all that I can think of then,
Is will I ever be made warm agen ?
Same Old New Year
Despite the chimes and fireworks,
Despite the cheers and resolutions,
New Years start off slow –
As continuity, not revolution.
The banks begin on holiday,
The schools are easing into term –
There aren’t too many early birds,
But then, there aren’t that many worms.
The world is in need of a lie-in,
Before the problems start to press.
Even I am barely trying,
Slurring rhymes with extra esses.
Soap Bubbles
There’s a poem that I meant to write,
Back when I wrote them ev’ry day,
Back when I still had things to say –
I should have said it then.
And now, I don’t remember quite,
Except it would have been a hit –
Before it faded, bit by bit,
And stayed within my pen.
But humour me and let me quote to you
Some lines I almost wrote –
Some lines I never got to know,
Yet knew were quite the best I’d ever show.
Ah well, no point lamenting,
Or resenting one that floated off instead –
Although, I sometimes wonder
At the hundred things that moment might have said.
There’s a poem that I meant to write,
Back when the poems wrote themselves,
As passionate as magic spells –
I should have cast it then.
And now, the page is far too white,
And now my metre’s far too slow.
I had my chance, and let it go –
It won’t come round agen.
But sit with me and let me read
A few more lines I never freed,
Some lines I never knew I knew –
Adieu – into the ether with god-speed.
Ah well, no point regretting,
Or forgetting all the other ones that stay –
I wrote too many verses
To waste curses on the one that got away.
Roses are…um…
My love is like my writer’s block
It sneaks up from behind,
It twists me like a weathersock,
It leaves me deaf and blind,
My confidences sharply fade,
My workings have resigned,
As all at once, my serenades
Have quite escaped my mind.
Dry January
I overindulged last month:
Had far too many ideas.
Now I’m a bloated, empty husk
Who’s run right out of tears.
My motor’s barely revving now,
From weeks of crunching gears.
My spark is fused, my wit is blown,
I haven’t a thought to call my own.
The Poets’ Almagnac
One more tot and then I’ll start –
My pen’s uncapped and primed,
Indeed it’s been that way all afternoon.
I know my almanac by heart,
With beats precisely timed
And metric feet to dance to ev’ry tune.
It lays it out by grid and chart
Of syllables that chime,
By trochees by the phases of the Moon.
But writing’s such a thirsty art,
Especially when it’s rhymed –
But one more tot and I’ll be starting soon.
Tick-Tock, Writer’s Block
The ants are marching ten-by-ten,
Running through my brain,
Where nine little Indians
Are dancing for the rain,
With eight green bottles
That they’re trying hard to fill,
And seven for a secret
When Jack falls down the hill.
Six geese are laying,
Though they’ve nothing yet to show,
With no knick-knack or paddy-wack
Where five men went to mow.
This little piggy stayed at home,
When the hickory-clock struck four
But three in the bed, in my empty head,
Find counting such a bore.
So two chirping crickets
Are all that’s left behind,
As one lonely tumbleweed
Is blowing through my mind.
Rhyming Couplets 