POE.TREE

Yesterday, I submitted a poem,
And now, they are asking me how 
And in what ways
Poetry has impacted my life. 
It is hard to explain 
What writing means to me. 
So, should I leave it blank?

I love it that much that I made a list.
A list of words to create
Poe.try,
Such as sepulchre and sedative, 
Such as disparagingly and dissident,
Such as poppies and redundant.
But the page is still blank.

I can’t answer
In what ways poetry has influenced my life, 
Without showing them how
Each memory, 
Each feeling, 
Each fight –
I wrote it down,
I watered it, 
With words and phrases,
With idioms and spaces,
With rhymes and lines,
To grow my own 
Poe.tree.

Stanzas dictate my entire existence!  
Two weeks ago, 
I felt extremely low, 
But then,
Some girl texted me on Instagram
That something about my poems gives her life.
It’s crazy how her comment inspired me to strive
For more words to plant,
On my own land, 
In my forest of poe.trees,
Even when I believe I can’t.

I saved my favourite poems, 
In a folder, in another subfolder.
And in the morning,
While other people drink coffee or tea
I devour the luscious fruits of POE.TREE.
Poe.trees other people created, 
Poe.trees they cultivated,
After staring hours and hours at a blank screen. 

© Elena Natroshvili

IG: 16minutepoetry