Writing Tip #100: SCHEDULE WRITING TIME. If you wait until inspiration strikes, you may never get anything written. Set aside specific hours when you will sit and write-or try to write.

-------from Writer's Digest, July 2003, "101 Tips to Get Published"

I told her to stop
Twiddling my thumbs
And unzip the laptop
Use fingertips only
When tapping the keys
Easy on the touch pad, it's sensitive
I got two extra batteries, baby
An A/C adapter so we can do it all night
Go ahead, write something sexy if you like
Nahhh, she said…
Where in the hell has this Dell been?
The plastic hinge in back is cracked,
Screen's smudged and the keys are sticky
I said, Fine then…
Act like the rest of your gender
I got other files waiting on me
There's always a new document
Untouched and in front of me
Whenever I so much as tap my fingers
So don't let the space bar hit your phrase
On the way to your next sentence
She pursed her apostrophes tersely and cursed me
I'm gonna take my werdz and leave!
Fine, I said, go write ahead and press return
And remember, honey
If you can't write something nice
Don't write anything at all

Alright already, she reluctantly relented
But I'm not sure I like your intonation
Wipe that smug expression off your page
Quit acting like you're Mr. Write
And start handling those adverbs…lightly
So I did
I let her scroll around in some old stanzas
But I was disturbed by her superlatives
And her tendency toward the metaphorical
I, myself, having come from a long line
Of comparative similes

She said she wanted a journalist or a novelist
Or better yet an essayist, anything but a theorist
And what the heck is a philosophical sociologist?

Look at you! I backspaced,
Telling allegories after we just met!
You're no more of a novel than I am a novella
Or a best seller
Just stick with the anecdotes, sister
Til we decide to have syntax
Be honest, no hyperboles
I like cursive, but print is nice too
I only used highlighters once, didn't inhale
But that was long before I became a writer

When it seemed she was ready to hit the page
I began with keystrokes, upper and lowercase
But she backed off after half a fragment
Barely enough for a phrase

I immediately released the keys
And tucked in my laptop with a shrug
She got introspective, then a little reflexive
Before admitting that she really needed me
As much I was pretending not to need her

This indentation wasn't obvious
For several more paragraphs…then
One day, out of the blue-blackest ink she said,
Gimme back my possessives you plagiarist!
You're nothing but an unedited rough draft
Waiting for some red hot stylus
To help you correct yourself
Well, I'm not gonna be that kind of pen!
You hear me in there, writer? I'm not!
I just can't! I mean, sure,
We've collaborated on some great pieces
Shared some irregular tenses in the past
But my future is conditional at best
I have magic marker dreams too, ya know
And for more than just your childish construction paper
She closed her eyes and crossed her tease
I could tell she was about to cry
All over a perfectly good document
So I made her put her fonts back on
Told her to stay off the Whiteout
And try using some bolder italics

She took me literally
And reached for the big dictionary
So I slipped her an old thesaurus
She said, Oh yeah…something like that!
Now copy me like a homonym
If you know what I really mean
I told her to turn around and face the fax
Prefixes and suffixes can't be joined like that
Besides, I've never tried syntax
Without structure and grammar
I might end up authoring a compound
Or a complex sentence but not both
No matter how good another run-on may sound
So stay in the margins where I can see ya, sweetie
And get back on line
This poem is over