poem: We Paint the SkyA Chapter by Marie Anzalonefor EP, may you live your dream
We paint. We paint because we see. We paint because we feel, hear, smell and taste more. We paint because 250 generations of oppression; the sight of machine guns pointed at our knees and the smokestacks of crematoriums has never been enough to silence the voice of a free man or woman.
We paint. In colors, and tones, and in clay. In voice and word and prayer and deed. We paint in synch, we paint outside the lines; we paint each other, and our selves. We paint what we feel, we write what we see. We paint because to stop painting is to permit ourselves to die.
We paint the walls that encircle our bodies, we paint the doors that permit us entrance into sacred spaces, we paint the births of genius and the death of innocents. We paint bones. We paint the sky. We paint ourselves into corners, we paint our minds free of traps.
We paint because we love too much, and we are too much present with the nature of things. And when our hearts feel broken enough from grief and the despair of not knowing we paint our emotions in bitter crimson slashed with electric blue.
And when we sing with joy, we paint that, too... golden tones and golden notes and golden words dripping honey. We paint our anger into black swords to pierce our enemies and we paint our desire into the shape of the spaces of those who would fill our hearts. We paint our wishes for the world on the feathers cast by doves and let them fly into the morning breeze every dawn.
We paint because there have always been those who would hold us down and break our spirits between the rocks of conformity and we've learned to just say "f**k it," there is no guarantee of anything in this life so get busy living it. The road of most resistance starts at the doorsteps of our hearts, and we have painted every bleeding foot along the way.
And still still, there is more to describe- we paint because drawing breath is an agony and exhaling an exstasy and somewhere in the space in-between we think we once found a truth; and the eternal part of us desires to share this truth at all costs
only it's never quite how we pictured it, and it's never quite received the way we want and the paint drips with our own blood the handles of our brushes are our own bones our own tears become the words to our most beautiful love songs and we know we'll never get it right before we die- getting up every morning and facing our own limited truth is a courage so divine most men quell and women stay enslaved in silence.
As transgressors we are punished for our audacity and we are shunned by our families- our excesses are weighed in pounds of flesh, and those who love us most for our art also hate us for what we do to ourselves to hold on it
and yet... with every last breath we draw in this life, we somehow look out into the world and pick up our brushes sharpen our tools, and with bent and broken spirits, faltering hands, and despairing minds...
... we put pen to paper, brush to canvas... and we paint.
© 2012 Marie AnzaloneFeatured Review
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Added on August 22, 2011Last Updated on August 23, 2012 AuthorMarie AnzaloneXecaracoj, Quetzaltenango, GuatemalaAboutBilingual (English and Spanish) poet, essayist, novelist, grant writer, editor, and technical writer working in Central America. "A poet's work is to name the unnameable, to point at frauds, to ta.. more..Writing
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