(September poem)

---Driven, on impulse---

A burning, an itching
a driving, a compulsion
in my bones;
a thirst,
a twisting of the lights
and of the tones.
& I've got to get it down,
get it down before it's flown,
this impulse that is telling me to get

a certain hold. A thought
that twitches as it ferrets
through my mind;
a vision,
a symphony so bright it leaves me blind.
But it's burning to get out,
to get out
and leave behind
the restraining order that's been placed upon it

in my head, it's pounding,
it's throbbing, begs my soul
to set it free
of thinking, of echoes,
all this troubled poetry -
set it down in black and white
as I write
into a prison
on a page that's been constructed to hold my insanity.