Love Poems from a Broken Heart

He sits down to a computer
And he tries to write poetry
But all he comes up
Are words to fill the blank verse

Words that don't flow
They stop
They consider
They rid themselves of substance
And dance with cliches

He prays for inspiration
But he knows where it is

It left on the 505
And it's not arriving back here
Anytime soon

He paces and makes coffee
And chain smokes
And jokes to friends on phones
About how ironic being lonely is
When your profession is one that benefits
From being left alone

He holds the phone
Praying a text will come
A call to say he misses
Like how the author misses
Like how it's more than misses
Like it's missing
Like something's now missing
That wasn't before

He can't get in a car
And drive to his house
Stand outside and--

Not that he's ever done that before
Of course

But before he could
God, was that a sweet before

A pleasant way
Of how things were

Forever altered

Just one person gone
And now things are drab
They're blurry and bleak
And he treats himself to ice cream
When he should be writing love poems

He tells himself
It's okay to write
About the sad stuff

But he can't even bring himself
To do that

He gets fat and bloated
Gloating about projects
That exist only his mind
While he idles away the time
In diners with diners
Who hopefully could be
Replacement lovers
But honestly?

Not really

He knows what they want
He knows what everyone wants
And he knows what he wants

He wants to write love poems again

Perfect, see-through love poems
Like glass

He wants to delicately lay them down
Then let them out
Knowing they can make it
The ten-minute ride
To that other house

Now they'd just get lost
Even if he could write them
They'd be swallowed up
By cruel geography

Simply shattered
By the realization
That it's too far
It's just too far

So he sits and wonders
When it'll come

If it's an issue of time
Or an issue of strength
Or both
Or neither

And he tap, tap, taps his pen
And tries to begin again

But he can't seem to do it

Because all he wants to do
Is write love poems

But how do you write
Love poems from a broken heart