the pen usually atached to the hand, that's attached to the heart and unfortunately sometimes the brain (ignorant it is). Some of the best stuff ever written is felt and barely understood. me thinks.

I marvel at your command of words and emotion and context and fluidity.

Cornucopia of a poem, Odin, spilling out here on the page needing no picture for this because the words are enough. I felt myself reading this piece in two parts: questions, then answers. I so enjoy poetry of questions. Your description line touches on the heartbeat of artistry, including music...."driven by a need to give of themselves to others through their creations." This poem of yours swirled up so much imagery in my mind as I read, starting with "...heart made simple/By sifting apart passion's finery?" -- wheat from chaff, downsizing life to the essentials, filtering out unhealthy elements or entities. The breath's echo being a held-up mirror reflecting all breathing, one smile all smiles, one laugh all laughing. One main image conjured by the reading of your poem: I see a child's black crayon stabbing out stick figures with mad faces and sharp teeth expressing violence within. The child being too young to recognize that the black feelings page-drawn come from outside, then from inside themselves to outside again. The child is driven to give their feelings to others who see their picture (scraped knee feels better if someone sees it), which is also a pleading to know words (or frustration of having no words) for these darknesses, which progress from crayon to pencil in a diary: "Dear Diary, I hate my Mom!" Your language led me to look up 'dialectical', thank you. Invalidation vs. unconditional acceptance. This poem wraps itself end-to-end beautifully with your last two lines (wizardly do you work your last lines) "...child of our pen/.....warrior of our whispered words." The style you have of offering a divisional one-word or few-word line, introducing the following stanza, is unflinchingly effective in my eyes. ~~ Diana

Richly created and presented for the palate of hungry readers.

Ron

Brainy and richly perceptive ~

a very interesting perspective to consider
budd