#7 – The Muses Kept Knocking

THE MUSES KEPT KNOCKING

 

Not today, I told them

I don’t need what you’re selling.

 

I’ve got no pedigree,

I’m just a worker bee

and I don’t bow to the queen.

 

Not today.

 

But they wouldn’t let up.

 

So I let them in enough

to take a message —

a first line, a title, an idea.

 

Stuffed it all in a folder

and went on to other things.

 

Not today, I told them

I don’t need what you’re selling.

 

I don’t teach

I don’t preach

And I don’t have a voice.

 

Not one that counts.

 

So, not today.

 

But they wouldn’t let up.

 

I’m a fake.

It’s a mistake.

I don’t have what it takes.

 

No, no — not today.

 

But they wouldn’t let up.

Not at all, not once.

 

So I opened the door,

and the windows some more,

and out came my first poem in months.

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Poem©2022, Jen Payne. Painting, Open Door, Brittany, by Henri Matisse. #NaPoWriMo, National Poetry Month. If you like this poem, you can read similar in my books and zines, available from Three Chairs Publishing on my ETSY SHOP. They come autographed, with gratitude and a small gift.