Come With Me to the Poet’s Tree

blossoms surrender

orchard of inspiration

floating down wordseed

when the image of cold plums waiting in the ice box brings such satisfaction 

how could my enthusiasm ever wane?

when the image of a lover waiting for me like a lonely house deepens longing 

how could this heart ever grow cold?

when tender buttons are touched there and there and there

how could I place myself anywhere else?

Thank you, #NaPoWriMo, for today’s prompt: And now for our (optional) prompt. The American poet Frank O’Hara was an art critic and friend to numerous painters and poets In New York City in the 1950s and 60s. His poems feature a breezy, funny, conversational style. His poem “Why I Am Not a Painter” is pretty characteristic, with actual dialogue and a playfully offhand tone. Following O’Hara, today we challenge you to write a poem that obliquely explains why you are a poet and not some other kind of artist – or, if you think of yourself as more of a musician or painter (or school bus driver or scuba diver or expert on medieval Maltese banking) – explain why you are that and not something else!

From the Author:  Poetry is a natural product of us. It comes out of us just like nature. Today’s prompt gave me the feels about the deep gratitude I have for art and all its wonder. I am an artist and I can’t imagine being anything else. ‘Art is a fruit that grows in man like a fruit on a plant, or a child in its mother’s womb.’—Arp