where's my muse, damn it?

I've written six, maybe seven poems since school started. Out of these six or seven poems, one is working, two I'm still too close to revise, and the rest are just brain farts. They might work as filler in a manuscript, but I don't think they'll ever stand on their own.

I want nothing more than to be prolific. I want this even more than I want to be published or have an audience outside my program. I want to write piles and piles of poems...good poems. Yet, I have not felt the urge to write, the need to write, these past few months like I'm used to. Over the summer, in a mere ten weeks, I cranked out thirteen poems that worked. They might not be great poems, but I think they did what I wanted them to. Why can't I keep that kind of streak going now?

I can't help wondering if teaching is what is holding me back. It's the only variable that's different. Maybe I'm spending too much creative energy trying to be a good teacher, to inspire others to write good stuff (whether it be intro to poetry or English comp), and I'm left with too little to write my own. It isn't writer's block--I think writer's block happens when you have the urge to write but nothing works--right now I just don't have the urge. Sometimes I force myself to sit down and write because I have to turn something in to workshop, but I can only think of one time since the end of August when I felt compelled to sit down in front of the computer and create something.

Holy crap...writing poetry is becoming a job. Not a chore because it is still something I enjoy, but it is turning into something that I have to do rather than something I long to do. I suppose that was my plan when I decided to go to grad school--to block off time in my schedule when writing was a priority rather than something extra--but is the plan back-firing? Does having deadlines and pressures make the creative process less exciting, less organic? Does being a professional/full time writer take the passion out of it? Maybe I need to go back to HR, so that stealing fifteen minutes of company time to write that poem that's been floating around in my head feels exhilirating and fresh. Alas, then the only good part of my day would be those fifteen minutes and I'd hate the rest of my life again. I suppose I'll keep teaching and hope that I learn to balance my craft with my career just a little bit better.