Words escape me. Literally. They elude me. They disappear from me into thin air. They run from me like they’re making a prison break from Webster’s Dictionary rather than face the firing squad of my keyboard.

My words have drowned themselves in the bottom of my beer, scalded themselves in hot cups of coffee, and leapt in front of moving cars (leaving nothing but an ink splat) rather than bare the embarrassment of ending up in one of my stories.

And, I’m afraid punctuation is clearly not fond of me either. Exclamation points play dead at the mere sight of one of my tired sentences, periods abandon me (it’s bad enough my parents abandoned me but a period?), and colons mock me by always being: in the wrong place.

I’m even beginning to suspect that spell check is fucking with my head. Leaving words uncorrected just for sheer spit.

Words are narcissistic (like my mother but that’s another story for another time that will have to be written by another writer) for they will only show their true beauty when you flatter them with adjectives.

But still, I disappoint them like a bad lover failing to caress them, no foreplay, and no climax, my words unfulfilled and disappointed with my performance. (I swear I’m not taking this from my personal experience with women) (Really) (I’m not lying) (Women love me)

I have often suspected my words are in cahoots against me. When I’m out of the house, I sense they form Pulitzer Prize winners, great American novels, and observational humor worthy of sitcoms. But as soon as they hear the key in the door they hide in books I swear I could have written.

I have killed more sentences than wars have killed people. Why don’t I confess to my crime? I’ve tried. Believe me I’ve tried. I have written dozens of confessions but no one understands them.

Sometimes I can hear my words’ hearts beating beneath my floorboards (see, I even plagiarize...have I no shame?) to the point where they have driven me to kill myself. Sadly, my words hang themselves before they have a chance to live on my suicide note.

I’m done. Finished. In fact, this is the last sentence I’m ever going to write. Wait a minute, if that (and now this) is my last sentence I have to do better. It’s not dramatic, pithy, funny, or even remotely profound. I swear I’m going to put an end to this just as soon as I can find the right words.

Bio: Larry Silberfein