Home > Garden of Grasses > Life Graffiti

Life Graffiti

by Beth Pauli
Can passivity be orange?
Purity is white, envy green--
seems that orange is free for the taking.
But why all of this labeling?
An honor student, a thug,
a self-contained underwater breathing apparatus,
the benefits of these words are not plentiful.
Perhaps they aid with a longer dive
or allow a preconceived notion of a body
to be formed, but is this all?
As sure as the puma will hunt,
the labels will hurt.

Ten thousand fireflies light up
the back yard of my home
where I sit in the window sill
stroking my plant thinking
of your skin and eyes and hair.
Lonely I label myself
and no bad fortune is avoiding my path.
Experience is to be gained
from beyond the glass.
Take a cup of fresh brewed coffee and
offer it to the dawn of creativity.
Smile when handed a blank slate.
Let your own cup overflow,
and allow your life
to be the graffiti free from the labels
you leave behind.


Garden of Grasses Home Page
Copyright © 1997 by Beth Pauli. All rights reserved.