Blank slate

The tight, sharp scent of fresh paint weaves familiarity into my lungs. I am lit by a current of warmth and streaming stillness as my eyes reflect the existence of last light. The peeling window is a transparent telescope, bending in burning contrast, curtains of blank, lifeless ice, still rivers down ripped brown bones. It shapes the dusty calm of brightness, shifting patterns and forming minuscule, precise rivers of luminescence to display on my open face. My mind drifts forward in the river of impossibility. I see my own eyes project what can never be elsewhere imagined onto the stark, crisp canvas. Fingers grasp the marked old stem of ideas failed, of visions brought to life, my nimble fingers relentless in rubbing its dried personality, chipping away, silent. Silent rings the feeling of how I squeeze out liquid promise onto the stained palate of assurance, how I press down the worn bristles of my artistic weapon into mounds of universal abundance and bend the colors into a unique mix of Now and Me. 

    I abandon the world of the present, of sweet silence, and press string-bound sound into my ears, letting the gusts of Indigo Girls and Indie Pop carry me into oblivion. My hand lifts. I streak vivid lines of texture, of never-ending motivation, I create my own momentum of crying movement, of shaking easel, of the scratch of ideas against blank slate, how my hand grips the brush hard, and how the brush carries my eyes across the canvas, twisting, jabbing, punctuating ideas in shoulder-deep reflection of feeling. Time drowns in lost thought. 

I unplug my mind from music, the battery of my idea peters out. I look at my soul's finished creation for the first time. My eyes are mirrored in the features of someone else. Fire engulfs the edges of deep black curls, a dark complexion resonates in natural beauty, eyes resting in peaceful consideration of thought. I see no one, I see everyone, I see myself. Layered concepts reveal my mind in light and dark, rushed flames push inwards to delicate pinpricks of careful highlight, elevated cheekbones of confidence, eyebrows pressed in calm concentration of intense thought. I set down my tool of expression, my mind unveils itself from the deep robe of feeling, of the inescapable streams of lit visions. The light has faded. Darkness envelops the window, shadowing in dulled cracks. My mind releases. I walk away into the silhouette of nothingness.