NaPoWriMo Day 2

Bear with me while I expound a mite. The suggestion from NaPoWriMo/FB was “Today’s Prompt: Write a poem inspired by your favorite painting or piece of art (feel free to post that image with your poem)”

On the website, the challenge was “write a poem inspired by, or in the form of, a recipe! It can be a recipe for something real, like your grandmother’s lemon chiffon cake, or for something imaginary, like a love potion or a spell.”

Sorry, didn’t quite do either of those but was perhaps inspired by the first. I call bonus points for a Latin title!

Nullae apologiae

I am fond of my tools. No apologies.
I have made others swear
not to touch my scissors.
I am loathe to let the unwashed
use my cast iron pans.
This is not to say that I care for all
my tools equally. That would be a lie.
Many tools are just here
because of something broken,
something that required a
larger pry bar or higher step.
But my real tools…

I am writing on a keyboard now
but I care for some fountain pens.
I keep them clean and filled and flowing.
I look forward to hearing them scratch
and glide over my notebooks. These are
different colors, some lined some graphed
but all stand ready for notes or sketches.
I laugh some days to see the notebooks
in my bag, stashed against that time
I need to write and write NOW.
There may be two or three or more
depending on how long
since the last culling.
I carry my laptop as well. It is
the modern writer’s companion:
An office, a library, a file drawer,
a shoebox of photos and letters.
I chose it as one might choose
one sword over another —
power, heft, beauty —
letting the mythos take care of itself.
But today, I really came to tell you
of my brushes. And their bamboo case.
I have recently come to paint and
while there are many things you need,
mainly: paint, paper and brushes
and though many will tell you to
waste no money on cheap paper
stint on paint if you must
I am here to say — I love my brushes
Washes and rounds,
filberts and angles
the bamboo roll-up case unfurls
the handles blue and green and red
the big brushes curvaceous butt to point.
like trout to fly rising,
swirling in and out of color and water
gliding and breaking on paper
splashing and narrowing
suggesting the leaf, dropping in a cloud
blending skies, raising hills,
And then, brush again.
Stirred and shaken clean, smoothed,
laid back amongst its peers.
Slipped into neat elastic loops that
may hold more than one smaller brush
or just one big juicy one
they wait their next adventure.
I arrange them by type and
my favorite rounds seem to
always land in the center.
The bamboo, simply stitched in white
rolls up into a hand-sized sausage
latching on the outside
with a flash of lucky red cord
fringed and festive.

Addendum:

While adding to my paint and brush collection recently
I took out a small note book to check on a brush size
and a paint color. I laughed to the shopkeeper – I
need to check so I don’t end up buying the same color
over and over again. She returned my laugh as she
scanned my items – oh no, that’s very wise.

Just another little notebook to carry.