Vow

The words mean nothing until I say them.

I can cross them out. I call them liars.

I am the liar. Words are the only truth

I possess. I betray them. I leave them to rot

in pages of half-abandoned notebooks.

I forget them, the orphaned children

of my fickle interests. I impregnate

my mind, birth breech poems, begrudge

them the labor pains. I am unfair. I am cruel.

I promise them life and decline to nurture

them. I let them become stale in my veins,

dried up blood (or is it ink?) crystalline,

unyielding, definite. Everything they never

wanted to be. They wanted to flow

and change. Create and destroy.

I have destroyed them. I am sorry.

These words will live. I say them out loud.

I shout them. These words will live.

Author's Note

I feel like the revelation comes too abruptly. What do y'all think?