I, I, I

My thoughts are suffocating
with this ‘I’
but I don’t know what else
to use
unless I want to speak about
myself in the third person.
I wince whenever I try to put thoughts
to paper,
words I want to translate
into poetry.
‘I’ gets in the way.
But who’s a better witness to my experiences
than myself?
Then ‘I’ brings its cousins over
and I am crowded with them,
a tinge of embarrassment
for coming across as navel-gazing:
I, my, mine, myself, me
I want, I wish, I do
I, I, I.

by Ziallo Gogui

photo credit: Emre Can Acer