Remembering Creativity
Writer’s block is something I’ve become
all too familiar with,
the blank screen or piece of paper screaming
at me with a loud emptiness,
mocking and teasing my lack of ideas.
To think I used to describe myself as creative…
hah.
That aspect of myself,
that spark inside,
that burst of imagination and
will to create—
that is no longer a part of me.
It’s slowly been pushed out
and suffocated,
a mop rung and dried completely
of its contents,
a tube of toothpaste squeezed empty
from the thoughts of adulthood,
the worries, the fear of reproach,
the harsh striking slap of reality
looming around every corner
ready to pounce.
As a child, all I wanted to do was create,
however the results may turn out--
no expectations,
no judgements,
no worries of what others would say about me or my work
when my back was turned.
And so the creativity swirled out of me, however it could,
grasping my markers or chalk or paint brush,
collecting vases full of sea shells
for my fairy houses,
pushing the camcorder button,
or typing out manically the newest of my short stories,
words flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup
slithering while they passed, slipped across the universe.
Concocting a product out of mere
vacuum,
something out of nothing--
What a beautiful existence.
I’d like to think my creativity
never really died,
but perhaps instead became dormant—
took a nap for a long while
in a far off garden shed perhaps,
waiting with the other childhood attributes
that long to get out and be among the flowers once more,
finally, permitted to release itself
without fear of others’ opinions
or even my own...
especially my own.
If I can relinquish creativity from its prison of
overthinking, overanalyzing,
and fear of rejection,
then perhaps it will surface as it did before,
awakened from its lengthy slumber
ready to reunite with me
like an old friend
Quote from song “Across the Universe” by the Beatles
