ars poetica
I didn’t exist until I took a pen.
I didn’t feel until I wrote it down.
My world fell and came true.
On the ground, between the dirt and the mud.
I watch dandelions fight
and clouds laugh.
Once on my feet again,
I searched for words.
They were kind, and they hungered for more.
But the stars in my eyes
wouldn’t reach the gutter where I stood.
I might have sabotaged myself,
or perhaps I just had more hope, more naïveté.
Odes make the shit glow.
Odd, how I never fully felt at home.
Nevertheless, and never more—
If it were true,
me, the master manipulator and swift narrator,
got broken-hearted for the sake of craft,
Shouldn’t it be easier to write it down?
If I don’t, what was the point?
of falling for a lover
who wasn’t that kind?
The pen might have saved me from madness,
dodging more than this one.
If I didn’t love the pen,
Would I take it all down?
Did it hurt, or did it cure?
If nothing else is true,
I would die protecting what saved my life.
And for him?
I wouldn’t cross the road on a green light.
words hurt.
And the more I try to martyr my intended victim,
the more I remember—
he needed to say it,
and then take it back.
I'm back at the pen,
and he is back at badmouthing his life.
for @nosebleedclub's April prompt ars poetica
