The Artist's Canvas Poem by john tiong chunghoo

the artist's canvas
it is similar as the world
we all strive to paint
with the redness of our blood,
the heat of our passions
and the brushes of our life

how floored we are at times
in the face of things,
how petrified when things
turn out to be red rather
than the blue of our thought

Love which I have always
perceived to be pink is
actually a warm glow of
your fair skin and veins
under the morning sun and
the translucent brown of your eyes
and also beige and
forest green so splendid
they charm the emptiness
of the grey of day away

the freshness of your breath
is a consuming white and
your touch, a trimming of the
brown of muslin for us to anchor
our ecstacy as we lock eyes

in between all these are
the wave and wave of frenzied strokes,
blobs, globs, fuzzy angles
cubes and circles that never
fail to carry us over to the rainbow,
our feet to tango, our heart to sing
and our voice to soar
of love, of sweet dates, of angels
flying over to our paths

the artist's canvas
it is inviting as life where
our imagination can cruise
beyond the ends of earth
free as a bird and rich
as all the colours on the palette