So this piece of poetry slips from my fingertips yesterday and the critic inside laughs in the way of locating an interest, nearly calling it an acceptable piece, a style of expression not seen in more than ten years—the days when walking through a forest and studying its rooting system proved to be more spiritual than Eckhart Tolle and John C Maxwell combined.
I know you told me so,
While playing pretend…
in a land of imagination,
locked away in the songs we sing,
a forest made of butterflies and other invisible things
and the birds that sing like…
they belong.
Each day I come here to fly,
To shake hands with the wind as it passes by.
My arms are raised,
I don’t ask for much,
just a little breeze to lift me…
up.
I’ve stood beside this tree a thousand times,
To watch the black squirrels play in the sunshine.
I’m powerless inside Mother Natures tight grip,
There’s nothing I can do to create something like…
this.
A piece of me comes here each day to die,
To share with the soil so other things can fly.
The trees are tall they bump into clouds,
Me and God, its such a small…
crowd.
I’ve gotta go the wind is calling me,
to write poetry for the birds to have lyrics to sing.
Life’s been short but I have no complaint,
The songs I share become my…
paint.
M’e
1/06/10
I’m a careless writer who never sets sail on a lake to locate invisible islands. Give me ink and I’ll pour you a thought. It’s not a gift it’s a game. Although yesterday I called myself an artist and it’s come back to bite me.
An artist is an expressionist—a free spirit or in some Native American circles the type of Medicine Man who envisions the future before it arrives in thirty seconds and still has the courage to make mention of how we should prepare for change. Artists tend to tap into a level of performance they can’t explain yet spend an entire lifetime chasing a horizon that unbelievers would describe as being nothing more than a midsummer mirage on a highway of broken dreams.
Artists come in all shapes, sizes, brands and mediums—they sing, they paint, they set up shop in the middle of a flower garden while doodling in saw dust once connected to a tree that screamed, “I can be a boat, a miniature figure that looks like your father or just a pop cycle stick ready to grip a pudding pop.”
Artists tend to look at a new year and giggle knowing there’s nothing they can do to resolute change, so they keep walking. Every now and then an artist might come across a circle of friends and mimic their reactions but nothing sticks, it’s not the artist way. Guess that’s why fate wrapped its four hundred pound frame around a simple blurting out of spurts and spouts yesterday when I penned out, “I am an artist.”
Today, by total mistake I’m wearing two different shoes. What in God’s name was I thinking this morning? Then it occurred to me, my old friend from elementary, middle and high school that kept me company during lunch, long walks home from school on snowy days with barely a lick of stitches on my back to keep warm and through my twenty’s, part of the 30’s and 40’s had dropped in unexpectedly and like always—he needed a pad of paper to do nothing more than write.
Mentally I'm horrified to walk out of this radio station control room—I fear the breath of a passerby who will never understand the openness an artist can’t hide. Sucking in two heaping lungs full of air I regain the confidence to be "him" realizing if it doesn’t happen those on the outside will locate a reason to come in.
Today is my day to be a freak,
two completely different shoes connected to size eleven feet.
So shy I truly am,
especially when being visited by this long time friend.
To go about my day is the map I carry,
taking note of the shadow next to me who seems to be staring.
At me!
Is it because I’m different and completely uncomfortable about the way I dress?
Only to hear the shadow confess,
“I need no reason to poke fun at thee,
it feels too incredible to be this unforgettably free.”
arroecollins@clearchannel.com
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