Outside the Lines
A small child grips a pencil,
fat and awkward to the tiny hand.
No matter,
in deliberate and measured intent
design breaks through the line
with broad shapes and strokes,
grander than the space
prescribed as the proper place
to inscribe one’s name.
A poet knows the written word and how
to shape its knotty linguistic labyrinths
of sound and sense to inform and captivate
diverse minds and intuitions.
Both child and poet write straight with crooked lines
and both break through conventions of words
spaced and sequenced according to the logical expectations
of straight-laced teachers of script and sense.
Bernadette McInnis, OSF
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