To paint

to write

to take whatever one’s hand keens after

in hand

and place it to the surface before oneself hold all the life

of one’s years at its tip and spills

we hope not from the mind so much

as from the fullness of heart for from there came

bubbling up the soul of being in

the first place

to write is to love said Merton I get this

when I write I first

love

then hope that

love spills over in inquiry praise confession appeal

my life gets to live more than just once for one

through the end of my pen

the splay of my brush.