Responsible, preoccupied, needs, daily duties, urges to create
Atlas beneath my half sky inventing my truth in beauty before I’m late
Days fast-paced, so full of shoulds and musts to meet and answer
When so few seek either truth or beauty; they don’t pay the financier
Is shielding the candle flame from darkness worth the strain?
Will it fill the hole within my soul and make me whole again?
Who asks the question, who seeks the answer, why does it matter?
To be tiny unheard voices, canaries in a coal mine sing and chatter
Will others ever even notice, do I toot my horn enough, too much?
Should I turn away, the impracticallity of art a waste, a crutch?
Pain of creation, alone, brings hope and joy in equal measure
Am I allowed to court my own fulfillment, pleasure, treasure?
Surely the needful life, time and energy and love, given just for others
Should hold satisfaction more than enough, or do we fear it smothers?
Halfway home is halfway gone as we pace the long road, forth, back
Can those who feel no need to quest, search and express feel our lack?
Can anywith these needs, a gnawing hunger, do other than struggle, strive?
To express their truth, their beauty, their highest selves, to feel alive
So they must, they will, despite missing ears and rock-filled smocks
Joining, if by life allowed, or wandering lost, life filled with bolts and locks
Living part-time normal, whose standard, driven by forces, no choices
Sharing inner acres, demons, angels, visions, driven, hoping the world rejoices
How then resolve which meets the test, what is beauty, what is truth?
All rhetoric and nonsense which holds no meaning in our age or in our youth
When greed rules, the basest, noble thieves and villains at the top
Media-fed, proud ignorance, mob mentality too rabid, too violent to stop
Till blood runs bright, grim death invited to the feast, an honored guest
Blood darkening the robe of this fell specter upon an endless quest
Despite all, head down, humanity crawls on, humbled by staggering blows
Yet art, beauty truth, hope lift our eyes where light a distant vista shows
Brent Harris Fine Art 