Innocence

Innocence

The pen in hand
glides gently over the
smoothness of
a clean
white
page.

Thoughts tumble out
over each other in the eagerness
to be expressed.
The pace quickens
as the need to fill the void,
to cover the emptiness,
increases.

The hand arches gently,
tenderly,
then gripping more tightly as the fingers
and thoughts fly over the barren lines.

In anxious fury,
the words stack up together
like rows of dominos
and push…
one after another
to an anticipated end.

Not long now
and the urge for completion is satisfied.
There is a wave of awe and
the discovery of a new freedom
at the artwork below.

The need vanishes as quickly
as it came
with the arrival of stepping beyond
what was before.

But there is also an overwhelming
sense of loss.
For it is no longer
a clean,
white
page.

6-13-96
1:00 a.m.

Another poem I wrote in my teenage years. This was the week after high school graduation. I've never posted it anywhere before.