The sad ladder I climb, quietly visible
on glinting walls, a vast canvased possibility,
the unstained imagination.

How alluring the mystery before words,
the images birthed in the fires of my soul.

How to paint them with the smudges
of calloused fingers. To bring color from inside,
to darken the boundaries set outside.

Perhaps it is better never to touch the rungs
but to stay in the eternal hint of wonder.

All my gifts will merely clutter this serene
clairvoyance that beckons the best of my soul.

Perhaps it is better to stand apart forever,
listen to the call, watch as my thoughts arise and fall,
contort, and reform.

There are no steps reaching high enough
to see over this seething storm,
unless I never bless its form
beyond the waves of my mind.

Handles retreating, disintegrating, impure.
Just the vast, blank world, a colorless universe
that contains all we could ever create.