blanksheet

[Doreen Peri]

(2004)

i awaken each morning.
the sun shines on a blank sheet -
sweet the morn, sweet the way
a ray heats my heart and
words pour out like butter,
the drought of sleep brings the seeping
of thoughts through my arms to my pen.
i record the truths of youth and age
like an unlikely sage.
i rearrange miracles with
the imagining of them,
spin stories with the creation
of a line, let a rush from my spine
surge into words in order
to make sense of it all.
i am only as tall as my pen allows -
with each dawn, i vow my attendance
by speaking the day alive
following the night.

I would die
if I could not write.