***05-09**symptoms Of Being A Poet Poem by Tom J. Mariani

What does one do
If one finds oneself
Suffering the symptoms
Of being a poet?

Try to gargle aloud
Uttering gargling sounds
It may cleanse the contagion
Before it enters your system

That's all you can do
Once the rest of the symptons start
You feel it in your head
It pounds in your herart

Your forehead feels warm
You cannot sit still
Words start coming out
Pages and pages you fill

It's like a fever
Compelling you to write
It does not come out easy
There still is a big fight

It's like a civil war
Words want out right away
Some content is stuck while
The brain argues for its way

Then writer's block hits
It's like serious constipation
On top of feeling ill
You can't go

You sit for a long time
Nothing happens
No need for paper
You have only pain

Accompanied by the urge
To let loose
The more you concentrate
Nothing happens

So you give up
Stand up and walk away
Take a long walk outdoors
Deep into Frost's snowy woods

Suddenly the urge
It's all there at once
And it catches you
With no paper.