CHALLENGE TO THE CONSCIENCE

I used to envy other artists
For the way that they created,
The way they molded the world
Around them I had hated.
But my dough heart baked and the years went by,
I came to see everything through different eyes.
Each creation was not a challenge
To my talent,
But a challenge to my conscience.
A chance to walk in brand new shoes;
To hold emotions in my palms
Like opportunities, like tools
That I'd never before had the chance to use.
To wear them like coats;
To wrap my frame in them.
To breathe lives I'd never live
Like oxygen from the surface
After a long swim and give
New thoughts to my greedy mind-
A stellar chance to find
The secrets of the universe.
Or a stellar chance to search
Deeper
And deeper.
Dig trenches in the ground I'd only
Scratched
By living in my own head.
So many of my creations
Are what other works bred.
Art is LIKE bread!
It feeds an aching soul.
An expression of hurt,
An outcry of gold.
There is no such thing as better,
Bad paintings don't exist.
A tiny window to another heart
Is the value in the canvas.