For the Poets

This is for the poets who didn’t sleep last night
Scrambling in the dark to find a pen to write
That rhyme with
As time went
And half your mind was written down
Just as the sun crept around
The other side
To bring you light
This morning when you still weren’t done
Laying down your fiercest ones
Yet
For those who don’t need therapy
Because writing is your therapy
Aside from how it sets you free
These words are your best company
Holding you tight
Wiping your tears
Rare friend with that power in my few years
Sometimes I get poetic diarrhea
The words just come, stopping the urge would be a
Crime against that floetry
As all the truth pours out of me
And I’m lighter, freer, happy as can be
Words that give me free reign
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Saying what I must, I’m releasing stifled pain
Blue, black, red ink
Let them know just what you think
About the evil in their eyes
Atrocities they devise
Or the love they give
All you’ll ever need to live
Besides your words
These nouns, adjectives, verbs
Letting them know you were here when you
Fly with the birds
For the poets who never told a soul
About that trauma, scars and suffering you hold
Inside your pen
Take the time to write it down
And then
Tell a joke that isn’t funny
But don’t go over it again
For fear they might just get it,
In your face, they want to be your friend
So you tell them it’s just words, it’s just pretend
Poetry’s just a means to transcend
The fake with the real
Another means to heal
Express what you feel
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Speak to the world in that rhythmic appeal
Can’t lie from that zone, afraid what you’ll reveal
To those who see with their minds
What you hid between the lines
Although most don’t understand it
Poets recognize the kind
Of science it requires
To take this art form higher
You couldn’t stop writing if you wanted to
The consequences could be dire.