Writer's Block

Sometimes the words just don’t come,
so I retreat into a land with tall clouds the shape
of towers, minarets pointing to a golden sun,
a sea stretching to the horizon filled with ships
as big as worlds, ships which communicate using birds
as big as a man, with great flowing wings
as long and as colorful as rainbows,
with beaks that could cut a star,
with haloes like the milky way.
The great world-ships cast off from docks
that contain cities, and have all the heartbreak of cities,
lovers walking hand-in-hand, old men alone with dogs,
old women sewing clothes for grandchildren who never call,
ladies in flowing finery with dresses designed to make your head turn
and looks designed to make you ashamed of looking.

But I am gone, on my world-ship,
where everyone knows my name:
the monkeys in the jungles, the bell-boys
of the woodlands, the horses and the cities
of the plains. In my world-ship I am king,
and I need not worry about the piece of paper
sitting on my desk, blank,
a quill pen on top of it dripping ink.