not a complaint, really, but close to it

why do I write your poems, you
who every night this week
have spun phrases, skillfully braided
& murmuring like rivers of liquid silver
in my ears, just on the edge
of sleep coming

if I get up to write,
you are appeased and me sleepless,
the poem a gift that hums
so sweet I can almost
forgive the timing.  but
not quite.

I am once again
the butt of your joke, the
comedic straight man,
yawning, stumbling & stretching
into poetry

but such magic you twist
on either side of sleep
I am onto your game now
and catch your words
not at my desk
but scrawled in a notebook
on my nightstand
without glasses
& by moonlight

sometimes
in the morning
I can even read

what I wrote

 

About Susan L Daniels

I am a firm believer that politics are personal, that faith is expressed through action, and that life is something that must be loved and lived authentically--or why bother with any of it?
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24 Responses to not a complaint, really, but close to it

  1. Oh! How true Susan ~ nicely captured 🙂

  2. Yes! I know this experience. Awaking to scrawled mystery words in my bedside journal. Sometimes written by the light of my phone because I am too lazy to turn on the light!

  3. George Ellington says:

    Selfish of me to say, yet your broken slumber provides us with such beautiful verses to enjoy.

  4. Bruce Ruston says:

    sometimes
    in the morning
    I can even read

    what I wrote

    brilliant comment on life I use the computer most for that very reason

    • 🙂 yes, I use the PC when it is on, but for my creek walks, and things written elsewhere in the house or out of it I use pen & paper. The legibility is better on the PC, of course, but there is, I think at least, more energy to my words when I have handwritten them. Not sure why.

  5. Trent Lewin says:

    Rivers of liquid silver indeed. Well done Susan!

  6. davidtrudel says:

    Excellent write about something that so many of us feel. I just let a certain amount of those thoughts and words and phrases tumble by, trusting that there will be more to come.

  7. paulaacton says:

    I also suffer this at work and end up with a pocket of half scribbled notes on bits of till roll most of which I cannot read later

  8. nelle says:

    Well expressed, on target.

    rofl… as mentioned elsewhere,so true. We writers are an amusing lot when our craft calls us to inspiration. I never suspected a word or phrase emitted high pitched whistles, but I hear them, so there you go.

  9. Jeremy Nathan Marks says:

    It sounds like you are being given a gift. And like all gifts, it comes with a price. 🙂

  10. I Don’t Undestand where you have or find the time to really concentrate on anything else girl. Glad Im a recipient !

  11. unfetteredbs says:

    the poem a gift that hums

    thank you for your songs 🙂

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