Thursday, March 08, 2007

pomes of buddy don: The Only Thing


The Only Thing

Every day I face the same dilemma
In trying to determine what to write.
Did Austen face it while creating Emma?
Or Dickinson with certain slants of light?

Was Robert Service stymied now and then
Or were his rhymes as easy as they sound?
Did Twain sweat blood when inking his sharp pen?
Were Dostoevski’s words always profound?

With illness as a primary distraction
Then how could Marcel Proust still hear his muse?
Since suicide for her held such attraction
How did Virginia Wolfe so long refuse?

For those of us who know no other way,
Except to strive to say what we must say,
Though leading us astray, the need to write
Determines everything, both great and slight,
And though we might not reach what we pursue
To write’s the only thing that we must do.

(ifn ye wonta make a comment, ye gut to click on 'link' below.)

4 comments:

Anne Johnson said...

"Nulla dies sine linea."

I think it was Raymond Chandler who forced himself to stare at the blank typewriter page until he got so bored he absolutely had to write.

Nice pome.

Jean said...

Sir, you offer much to ponder. Well done.

(sent here by Eric, SWG)

Elisson said...

Those days when I am faced with Writer's Block,
I head down to the cellar, where a crock
Of Ethanolic Bev'rage doth await
The Ethanolic Beverage's fate.
That is, to be decanted in a glass,
Consumed, perhaps with steak, perhaps with bass;
Thus to inflame imagination's wit.
It's that - or maybe I'll go take a shit.

Libby Spencer said...

I would love to say something clever,
but that, I fear, would take forever.

Nice poem.