Lost for Words

To speak or not to speak, that is the question.

Well, it's too late now, I've put my name down.

I sit at home trying to come up with something,

trying to find just the right words.

Margaret Atwood once said:

a word after a word, after a word

is power.

But what if my words need recharging?

 

I wander lonely as

the first time poet up on stage,

wanting this to be perfect,

to have all the wonder of a Dylan Thomas childhood,

to dig with my pen like Seamus Heaney.

 

My dad gave me words of advice,

write something witty, 

write something edgy,

write something dark.

You're from Salford, son, he said,

just like John Cooper Clarke.

 

It's only words, as the song says,

but words are everything,

words are life.

Words count. 

From will you marry me?

and congratulations it's a girl,

to my letter of resignation 

and I'm sorry for your loss.

 

I work on these words

late into the night

writing these pages,

telling myself over and over, 

that I can do this, 

that I've been writing stories for years,

and that poems are simply, 

the other side of the same coin.