Writer’s Block Lament
by Mary Bradley McCauley
Days spent in nothingness!
Exercise of mind and body inert!
Writing stilled!
Ambition gone!
Direction lost!
What folly attends as my constant companion
Pulling me from accomplishment?
Have I a lazy, unproductive Muse or
Perhaps I have no Muse at all.
Is my apparent lack of goals, ambition, and desire set in stone or,
Can it be chipped from the granite of sedentary illusion?
Who has the chisel and hammer?
Certainly not I.
What lights the fire of desire?
Friction?
Present to me, guiding light, the spark,
No, at this time I need a flame,
An ember would be lost in the ashes of despair.
A spark, a flame, a roaring fire.
Burn! Burn! Ignite a passion
Inflame a desire--
Let the fire rage uncontrolled
Burning away the lethargy, the inertia,
The pyre of defeat.
Let there rise above the ashes
A purified soul of intent,
Raging with the need to do, to be.
A soul inspired to create from the rubble
A story, a poem, a play,
A phrase that sparks the imagination of mankind,
and produces in this physical being that it possess
A sense of fulfillment,
Accomplishment,
A reason for being.
Let there be a desire that rises from the ocean of fear.
Fear, that a wave might break
Against the shore of criticism
Or wash upon the island of rejection...
Please, oh mighty source of All that is,
Create the storm that lashes the water
Into a surging tidal wave of need
So that a river of desire breaks free
And winds its way through the valley of
I can!
I will!
I do!
And at last pours into the Gulf of Publication.
Hear my cry
From this plain of discontent,
My mournful plea,
Echoing in the Valley of Nothingness.
Hear, I beg thee with a burning heart,
My desolate cry, my pitiful wail
And rescue me.
Guide me onto the path
That leads to the city of fulfillment,
And, at the end of my journey,
May I lie down to rest
With the contented feeling that
My life was not in vain
And I can say with pride,
“I came, I wrote, I did my best.”
Oh Mary, this is such a powerful outpouring of emotions many writers who experience a writer's block will appreciate. It's a most wonderful poem.
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