The poet sits, pen in hand,
blank paper laying on the table,
distasteful as an unwritten tombstone

or is it a door, waiting to be opened,
leading to, perhaps,
a beautiful new world,
or an incomprehensible tragedy,
or an inconsequential lark

the pen, once it touches the paper,
pushes, pulls, turns–
leaving behind symbols
to approximate that
which had existed, before,
only in the mind
of the poet

later, the poet hands
the paper to the reader,
who converts the markings,
stained onto the page,
into ideas, filtered through
the personal framework
living inside the reader’s mind–
word, phrase, line, stanza

building up each
into a cumulative whole,
which, if successful,
leaves behind
something new,
passed from one mind
to another

later,
the poet sits, pen in hand–
starting again