There are constraints. Rules.
Some of them dictated by the medium,
or the paint you use. Some dictated
by each brush, types of bristles and shape.

There are constraints. Your knowledge
or lack of it. The light. How you see
or don’t see. The lack of an object to paint,
but instead emotions and heart,

Ephemeral things. Strong and powerful
and evaporating with the winds of life.
You have to capture them when you feel them.
Another constraint. The world is full of them.

Some mine. Some outside myself.
What will people love? What will they hate.
I have come to care less about those things
as I age.

In the end, it is the constraints that mold you.
The energy and effort and imagination
spent pushing past them, while somehow pretending
to fit in.

About this poem

About painting. About life. Poetry is never about one thing.

The picture was taken in my studio.

Tom