Splat (Notevember 2021, #25)

Where will you be when inspiration strikes?
If it does
Creeping up on you
Pouncing when there’s nothing to
write on, draw with, play
Or trickling away
     drip
         drip
               dripping steadily in small amounts –
but never readily available when it counts

Some try to force it
Getting hammered or strung out
And I have no doubt
many a masterpieces might have been made on marijuana
art assembled absent-mindedly on absinthe
canonical concertos composed on coke
But in neither drink nor smoke
do I find
the keys to my creative mind

It’s not so black and white
The muse’s box isn’t locked up tight
half the time, and open-lidded the next
blank lines, then sudden text
Clearly, since some types type away constantly
(and erase almost as much in review)
I’ve always had an admiration for those
whose creative endeavors begin anew
with each dawn
While mine can go months with the curtains drawn
Routine has never been my forte
most efforts cut short
rather than remain sustained
Rhymes getting increasinly strained
as my inspiration is drained
Fading into a dampening of head and heart
until the next unexpected attack of art

And if it turns out well
I’m sure there’s a muse somewhere looking awfully smug
And if it doesn’t
I can’t do much more than shrug
Then again
Sometimes inspiration just
hits you.