The Tattooed Poets Project: Tameka Mullins

Today's addition to the Tattooed Poets Project is Tameka Mullins, who writes the blog Lyric Fire.

Here is a poem entitled "When You're a Writer," which she offered up for us here at BillyBlog:

When you're a writer everything is brand new or old, or used or in a state of disrepair.

When you're a writer nothing seems to be happening while everything is moving at wind whipping speed.

In the midst of a rain storm you are bone dry and searching for something to quench your thirst.

The sun could be burning white hot on your skin and you're shivering.

The opposite of light is more light and darkness floods your room with rays of glorious yellow illumination.

The world is a wonderful and awful place and your need to document and define it can be a heavenly addiction or a mind sucking curse.

Your fingers, brain, ears and your eyes are always sore and broken from overuse. You look too long, talk too much or not enough and you think everyone is your friend and if they aren't they become the enemy. There is no in between.

Your smile is wide and narrow and your teeth gleam from brushing too hard but you never change your socks because you write better when they are dirty.

No one knows that underneath your Dior suit you are wearing undergarments with the names of all of your lovers written on them in black marker so they are forever close to you.

When you're a writer people love you and loathe you for your attention to detail and your ability to forget them all together.

Short walks take hours and long train rides are over in a minute because you deem it so. Your magic is majestic and you use it for good and evil.

A writers house is a mess and immaculate and their clothes hang neatly in a tight cramped closet with boxes on shelves that haven't been opened in years. Their contents have long been forgotten by the owner.

You check your e-mail every five minutes and never open your snail mail. It piles up and now holds stains from the coffee cup.

When you're a writer everything makes sense and nothing is a mystery. Well, except for the fact that you know not why you came to write, you just do. That is your lifelong mystery to pick at and play with.

When you're a writer thoughts, passages, paragraphs and sentences don't end. They begin. Over and over and over again.

Tameka is a native Detroiter who loves writing, networking and cultivating great relationships. Her professional background includes work as a public relations professional, radio segment producer, project manager and consultant for publishing and non-profit organizations. She wrote her first poem when she was 5-years-old and it consisted of just two words: "I dream." She believes that with persistence and passion dreams can be transformed into goals which become reality. Her novel Letters to Chyna, which delves into the emotionally charged issues of adoption is currently being reviewed and considered for publication.

Check out her tattoo over on Tattoosday.