A Rusted Hinge

Art block is not a void

it’s a crowded room

where every unfinished piece presses its mouth

against your skull,

screaming in a language you can’t yet hear.

It’s lead in the wrists,

a rusted hinge where the mind once opened freely.

You sit before paper like a prisoner

watching the key dangle just out of reach.

Then, almost spitefully,

you make something small

a sketch hardly worth a glance,

a line that feels like a mistake.

And that is when the dam splits.

The ink runs like blood,

color pours like floodwater,

and suddenly every forgotten canvas,

every half-born figure,

every idea buried in dust

comes roaring back with teeth.

They claw at you,

demanding their completion,

each one certain it is the chosen child

you must bring to life first.

What was silence becomes riot.

What was emptiness becomes avalanche.

And you are left gasping in the wreckage,

arms heavy with ghosts of your own creation,

knowing you’ll never finish them all

yet unable to stop

the storm you unleashed

with one trembling mark.