I like to think that most of my serious metaphors are pretty apt, but I don’t think I’ve tripped and fallen into one so completely apt as this one. It is rare when life’s metaphors line up so perfectly with life, but I’ve never been the sort to let a moment like that go by unremarked. I wrote this after almost six months without writing any poetry, which is a long time for me to go without writing at least SOMETHING, regardless of whether or not it might see the light of day, so I think you can see why it might have struck a chord with me as one of the first things I wanted share when I finally moved my blog to a home where the host isn’t going to sell my data to some “AI” company…

I spent a decade
Writing with the same pen–
The lone, cherished relic
From a time I don’t care to remember
Any other way–
Replacing the cartridge
Every time it ran dry
With a new one,
Complete with nib and spring
Since I can’t seem to open it up
Without losing that little wire.

It has become habit now,
To think that I must refill the well
Every time it runs dry.
To plan my already too-short evenings
Around a hunt
For its increasingly rare siblings–
Exact copies from the same line,
From the same stealthy raid
Of a supply closet
That was the final highlight
Of an ever-more intolerable job–
So I can carry on working
As if I have a limitless well
From which to draw.

Today, as the light, thin lines
Of my drying pen
Began to fade to nothing,
I grabbed a new pen
And carried on.