Cities of Sonnets

It was tantalizing, sweet completion Lines of blue ink filling white space Tastes of emotions, colors of consonants Music of vowels, syllables singing To create, and satiate Then, time thinned Responsibility and stress stepped in Poetry, after all, does not pay the bills Stop cloud watching and become an adult They said, and they were right So I packed her away, that silly girl relegated to the dusty back room of memory Gray and wilted, foolish scribblings Nobody cared about anymore Years, decades of feigned disinterest Begins to dissolve in rediscovering The flash of joy in composing Ignited by a song-writing friend Who dared encouragement Steps sluggish, atrophied, but there Saved in muscle memory I hungered for nourishment, for balance On unsteady limbs - I wanted my silly girl back And I have her, revived on Soup from My poetry sisters and brothers Now, I am gaining The reach of my wings Soaring over cities of sonnets Neighborhoods of roundels and rispettos A haiku hamlet, an acrostic alleyway Kingdoms of pantoums and villanelles To the unfenced openness Of free verse I am still the bedrock of me Stretching to climb taller trees. 2/23/19