The Hard Stop Ahead

I’ve surrendered so much:
watched the coins
vanish from my pocket
due to my need to write poems,
lost breath and energy
to that craving for ink,
dulled myself
with too many poems,
become deaf
to the music of poems,
blind to the sinews
and gymnastics
of poems

so I shall pick a marker
and say after this,
no more.  
No poems after
this day, or after writing
this many more, or 
once this happens…

If I don’t stop
I know only
that I will continue
and that feels not bearable
at all.  
It feels like a 
sentence,
not a 
joy.  
Not a life.

If I start again
I’ll at least know 
it’s too much a part of me
to be excised…

Who’s going to be there
in my mirror
the day after I stop?

I look forward to him,
to my face not on
a poet’s head,
no matter how little time 
we may have together.