I stopped writing for a while

because I thought I was doing something better
in a different form of writing
(so I guess I was still writing
but not writing poetry
{if you can call this poetry, really
[which I sometimes do],
but you don’t have to}
which, anyway, wasn’t so different
from the other stuff I was writing).

I replaced producing poetry
with writing lyrics
but then slowly found song composition
too difficult to continue
and then couldn’t pick up the pen anymore
for structuring simple free verse.
I couldn’t get back to where I once belonged,
back to the garden.
It was the end of the innocence
and pop went the weasel.

I couldn’t write no more.
I found there was no one to write to.

In prior times
I thought I was writing for an imaginary audience
but I realized I wrote
to the other end of the megaphone,
to whomever listened at an open mic
or a Zoom conference
or a circle jerk party where we all shared songs & stories.

It wasn’t ’til I found my latest circle jerk
that I found the will to write again.
Thank gods I have a new place to spew.
I am once again much more composed.