you bury her and dig her up again the next morning

I want to write for other people instead of writing for me. And a wall shoots down and chops off my hands in the process and I'm trapped, watching the future I want pass me by, but crippled, unable to do anything about it.

The closer I get to finishing a piece that I think other people will enjoy, the louder the resistance gets. I've tried asking for help, brute-forcing my way through it, implementing routines to just do the thing...

But the fear is always louder.

It's so loud I'm going deaf. At times I forget I even want to write in the first place. It's like the fear buries my life force so far underground I don't realize it was ever there. And then I'll have moments where I write something true that brings me back to life... only to bury myself once again.

It's like I have all this color in me and I pour grey paint all over the thing. Every day. Numbing my passion into a dreamy, dreary kind of sedation- something that doesn't feel bad, but doesn't feel much, either.

A coworker today asked me if I was okay. "You're lacking your usual fire," she said. Fire. I forget I have it when it comes to my work.

I want it back. I want it back. I want it back.