The Danger of Writing

The Danger of Writing



The danger of writing...

allow a single word

to appear on your blank screen

and it will call up its associates, 

many of which will not be your friends, 

and like mobsters, 

may take you on a journey 

you would rather not be having. 



The danger of writing...

especially at certain times,

times of vulnerability, 

when an image,

like this image
that now confronts my mind, 

an empty seat facing a river,

might evoke a provocative word.



I know where this is going...



Do not allow a single word to appear! 

Keep staring bleakly 
at the empty screen.



But the word appears

on the screen of my mind,

impossible to avoid

at five o’clock in the afternoon,

the winter sun descending, 

the biting edge of cold dusk 

settling into my soul. 



Emptiness... 

life passing relentlessly, 

second by second, 

like a river that never stops.

The curse of consciousness... 

unable to escape its loneliness,

seeking solace in the past,

finding only loss. 



The river... 

painful past to the left, 

anxious future to the right, 

the bleak emptiness
of the present 

drowning in its cold swirling waters.



The emptiness
of another evening

of another empty day...

the comfort of a drink, 

and then another. 



Mindless chattering
of TV voices...

voices of ghosts, 

illusions,

disconnected 

from the warmth of a body. 



The warmth of a body...

the empty seat. 



A passing car...

silence.



The cat... 

padding across bare floorboards

wanting food.



Wanting...
the empty seat, 

needing the warmth of a woman. 



Needs...

harshly exposed,

like a line of naked corpses 

waiting on dissecting tables.



Longing...

for a woman to sit beside me,

to contemplate a shared river. 



The empty seat...

the river flowing away
as relentlessly

as a poem of desolation

started by a single word.
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