Blank Page

I stared at the blank page on my desk, how it mocked my loss for words and strength to scribble with my full pen. Recently I bought a new set of pens in several colours. I found blue to be relaxing, black making statements and red to be correcting mistakes. But the ink in either tube was of no use if it didn’t form words on that blank page.

A tree had died and I was wasting its value even in its death. I mumbled an apology and sipped on my tea while considering to write a poem about the tree and how I grieved for its loss.

Even that appeared daunting. I got one word: tree.

I took another sip of the scorching beverage and leaned on the counter to stare at the page. That flat and dead piece of a tree terrified me.

Would I believe in Hell I was convinced it’d be made of blank pages.

It wasn’t fear of failure that plagued me. There was no fear. No joy. The inside of my head was an empty desert, similar to a Western movie before they’d open fire. My brain just didn’t start shooting. It wasn’t even waiting. It was blank, vast -- empty.

Like the page in front of me.

How a simple piece of paper had so much control over me . . .

Staring all the while, I drank most of my herbal tea in sips. Its scent didn’t stir ideas. All I got back to was ‘tree’ and perhaps ‘leaf’. Its heat warmed my stomach but was no comfort to my mind.

I placed the drained mug in the sink and looked out. White like the paper. I found snow to be sparkling; the page offered no such extra. Though, I wasn’t motivated to touch either. Both were cold, cruel and capable of killing you.

I tried to think of a plot, a theme, a character, species, eyes, superpowers . . . and stopped at a deadly jellyfish with its arms glued to a little girl’s leg and nearly killing her with it.