When canvas appears,
the head gets over its bewilderment.
Muscle follows eye the length of the arm
and a painting ensues.
Concepts are wings.
My head flies over fall forests,
dives off cliffs, darts through countryside.
A tractor in a wheat field.
A whale singing to the sea.
Hooves and flukes and fluttering gold
and walloping ocean,
the gaze has it all
and the brush is lovesick with
the end result two strokes into it.
And all this is an attic
with a window to traffic
and stacks of old work
guarding the door.
And a woman who moves through
the rooms below smooth and silky
as another brush
Here she comes with coffee,
her footstep on the stairs
downing my vision for the moment,
her body in the doorway,
returning this garret
to the address on the door below.
Still, it’s good to hug,
good to sip, the one place
that always will have me back,
feel the hands of another mold me.
The painting will be loved enough.
A man takes his own creation where he can.
