much assembly required

Ether,

Here on Substantiopetrapopulus there is an expression of affection that takes the form of a collection of Others' introspection (thence funneled into the serendipitous perfection of a multi-track compression) in which the enamored one in question, after a session of deep and mesmerized reflection, has compiled a selection of apropos lyrics and a painstakingly just-so progression of musical ministrations.

AKA, The Mixed Tape. One lover to another, or a friend to a friend. A compilation of songs meant to convey a variegated yet cohesive audio-quilt of simpatico sentiment.

Typically, the mixed tape runs between 10 and 30 songs (depending on the degree of the giver's obnoxiousness and/ or the extent to which the giver suspects the receiver needs a thoroughgoing, propagandized force-feed).

Segue:

The assemblage of a poetry manuscript to be submitted to a particular contest, I have found, is like the making of a mixed tape. Except on steroids and for the behoof of an indeterminate audience.

For poets who don't get out much, I recommend a cluster of nearby knick-knacks. I also recommend getting out more, but that is neither here nor there. Well . . . it IS there but it's not here. Here being this: a poem born of reclusion.

Desk Globe

The desk globe makes its case

For world travel—spun

By a thumb, brought

To a shrieking halt by a

Forefinger.

A random locale with special

Meaning, like grandmother

Through the fanning Scriptures—

Her horoscope

On linen.

The whole earth—our subtle

Recline, our gentle

Catapult through the entirety of time—full of places

To meet our makers, to eat

Manically, to walk, lance blisters,

And walk on.

Like grandmother across

Her boundless losses—

Orthopedic shoes to Calgary,

There to lay down her accreted

Planet of mostly water.

finger-filters and the unconceived next

Is frustration a necessary offspring of writer's block? Or, differently posed, what do you call a cessation of creative output that is not accompanied by the maddening anxiety spurred by the prospect of never being able to write again?

If it is what it is, regardless of the quantity or quality of concomitant emotions, then I have writer's block. If it merely describes a lack of production, then yes I am afflicted by the Great Bane.

But there's this: I feel no dread. I fear no depletion of soul. The once maddening anxiety is now only a simpering nag--little pin-prick-pokes sufficient at best to pester-out this Nothingworld admission:

For what seems to be the life of me, I cannot tell a story of my own invention; but, even if it means the death of me, I am quite content resting on my withered and dry-bone laurel--that penniless symbol of my tiny contribution to the world of letters.

Let there be a moral here. A larger-than-me application to my few and dear readers. Let it have something to do with satisfaction and patience. Let it stand in lieu of the myth of lost time. Because there is always time for our next great thing. Because great things can happen in an instant--a wisp in the blue sky to be snatched for a second, admired, spoken of, then let to filter through fingers back into the blue, back into the wider world to dissipate and never gather again.

And let that be OK; let it be enough to keep us eager, not anxious, for the next stunning sentence of our stories.

It will come. Or not. Something may or may not surely come. I am ready for it all. Or nothing. Either way. I'll be OK.