Again

I write the opening sentence.

I delete it.

No coherence.

I repeat it.

Same first line.

Same false hope.

Same design.

Same rope

I keep trying to climb.

"The thing about waiting is..."

I get halfway through, then dismiss

the whole thing.

Start over.

Same beginning.

My mind's not sober

to any other way.

This is the hundredth time.

This is the ritual, the climb,

the prayer I recite

every day, every night,

hoping this attempt

will finally make sense.

But it doesn't.

The sentence stays locked.

The blank page still mocks

my effort, my want,

my haunted chant

of first words that go nowhere.

I close the document.

Tomorrow I'll begin again

with the same lament,

the same sentence, the same plan

to start and fail and restart,

unable to chart

a course beyond the opening,

stuck in the opening,

always opening,

never going deeper.