Pen and Perfection

You have fifty different beginnings

but no plot to end.

So your stories are swallowed up

in the mentality that’s never had friends.

Perfection is your enemy but it loves to shimmer,

distracting you from finishing what you never start.

The shine keeps the simplest secret from you:

even shitty paintings are still art.

First, you imagine the pinball machine and the foundation,

then the shatters of the past that once made you complete.

Next, you see the man who watches his love forget his name.

But your pen never touches any story; they’re gone before you hit delete.

You should know by now that writing anything at all

is better than writing none.

The more you get out of the train you follow

the clearer your thoughts soon become.

You’re so afraid of failing them all that

you’re incapable of locking in one’s success.

The battlefield inside your mind is now

your loudest turmoiled mess.

What happens when you finish a story?

It could be that everyone hates what you’ve done.

But isn’t that better than hating

what you never let yourself become?

Imagine what joy in your life will look like

when you stop trying to force control.

Creativity is candor’s mouthpiece.

And creativity is the only freedom for your soul.