I cut out my tongue.

Articulation used to feel so natural.
I am out of practice.
I never considered myself a master of rhetoric and language,
but I prided myself in my ability to fluidly and coherently
translate my thoughts into words.
I was my own best stenographer—
dutifully and obediently transcribing
my investigations, analyses and conclusions,
passions, anxieties and recollections of time and place
into sentences, stringing my sentiments together
like pearls on a necklace.
With my metaphorical spinning wheel,
I would try my best to make sense of my situations,
spinning straw into gold, twisting wool into a unified thread,
and trying to weave these errant strands into a blanket of understanding.
This process used to feel so effortless.
And it was therapeutic.

These days, expression is like
prying impacted teeth,
like I’m grasping at straws, and trying, in vain,
to pull the unbudging sword from the stone.

Articulation was much easier when I was writing for someone.
I wanted to be eloquent. I wanted to be graceful.
I wanted to communicate matters of the heart
soundly, thoroughly and candidly.

Bereavement has yielded a loss for words.

A friend recently told me that he has an affinity for my art
because I don’t create for a larger audience.
I create for just one other.
He saw that my art-making acts as a quiet action waiting to be noticed
by an object of affection, and explained that the beauty behind my art
resided in my actions going unnoticed.

I fail to see that beauty.

The state of my union is not well.
I feel immobilized.
I feel alienated.
I feel alone.
I want to write for someone.
I want to paint for someone.
I want to sing for someone.
I want to nest for someone.
And now that I can’t, I feel frozen.
I don’t know what to do.

I don’t feel relevant.
I don’t feel poignancy.
I don’t feel like I have anything important to say.

I made love the content of my life.
Love is what kept me invested.
But when your mating call goes unanswered,
what are you supposed to do?
You can only sing for so long before losing for voice.
You can only spend so many nights out on the widow’s peak,
furiously scanning the horizon,
before losing your will to continue.

I hate sounding so desperate,
But I am desperate.

I want to do things for myself,
but it feels entirely too selfish.

I would feel the greatest joy
in having the opportunity
to make someone happy.