AGONY and ECSTASY – January 2011

AGONY and ECSTASY

By Mark Sconce

 

O Writers, O you chosen ones! 

And Poetasters on the run,

As I describe your agony

And then perhaps your ecstasy.

Come closer now, sit next to me.

 

You agonize, as is your wont.

You wonder why your face is gaunt.

You question why your soul lies bare

And contemplate your deep despair.

 

But wait! Before becoming too distraught,

Just look what agony hath wrought:

 

Confessions by Jean Jacques Rousseau,

And Walden’s Pond by Hank Thoreau,

And then The Isle of Innisfree,

That Butler Yeats’ soliloquy.

 

Each one caused a furrowed brow,

The same as yours is doing now.

So never quit, no never, never,

But double down on your endeavor.

 

Agonies like flowers bloom,

Enough to usher in our gloom.

 

Computers lead the way I guess,

We oft become their slave,

And to them every thought confess

And then forget to SAVE!

 

Alone in your Cialis tub,

“Perchance to dream, aye, there’s the rub.”

But take the pill the morning after,

Lest all your dreams give birth to laughter.

 

“You write with joy and inspiration;
You suffer an ecstatic fit;
You sleep, exhausted from creation,
And in the morning find: it’s shit.”

 

But suddenly you’re in the mood

And to Cialis tub you go.

The one beside you holds the Muse,

And soon creative juices flow.

 

And what about the ecstasy

That many writers seek and find?

The out-of-body consciousness

That overwhelms the mind.

 

The tears of joy, creation’s rain

That waters soul and soil alike.

The heart, the head, the restless brain

All ravished by the soul’s delight.

 

And what about the Writer’s Group,

Some twenty years in Ajijic?

You’d have to be a nincompoop

To miss a good critique.

 

And here’s the best one I suppose,

The one that makes it all worthwhile,

The one that wakes you from your doze,

And takes you down the aisle.

 

That cherished day, a letter comes

Addressed it seems to you…

“We’re happy to inform you, sir,

We have a rendezvous!”

 

“Our spirits soar in exaltation,

And once again there reappears

The awe of God…and inspiration…

The sense of life…and love…and tears.”