When Block

When I run out of words,
I sometimes think
that I lost my mind
in a troubled sink.

Trouble with syncing
to what I feel
is a wealth of rhyme
in my mind’s wheel.

When this feel I’ve lost,
I’m not the same.
Thoughts twist and turn,
searching to claim

what it thinks it knows,
what it thinks it wants,
what ceases to grow,
what ceases to haunt.

While these twists and turns
never to end,
never to lead
to the very next bend.

For a bend is a twist
and a twist a turn,
so bending this way
will unturn the turn.

And twisting that way
will unbend the bend,
so watch how you turn
‘fore you straighten your end.

A lesson I’ve learned
when writing a rhyme
is to feel the flow
and the flow in time.

For without the flow,
there’s no time for rhyme,
and what else is left
but a largely blank mind?

So at my keyboard I sit
with nothing to say
and nothing to do
all this long day

except stare at a cursor
blinking its tease.
All I need is one word
to set me at ease.

But the word escapes me,
unwilling to come.
Maybe I can bribe it
by acting dumb.

Or what I’ll do
to throw it a bone
is think of two words,
so it won’t be alone.

They’re “words” for a reason,
jointly they belong,
sharing the page,
forming a song.

But alas here I am
struggling to find
even one of these words
to jump in my mind.

So I must stop searching,
give it a rest.
Could be writer’s block
is totes for the best.

For if all hours spent
were on something else,
then I wouldn’t have time
to find a rhyme for “else.”