You told me to make a colouring book
of life, the black ink of experience
the lead in the stained glass,

to take the crayons of verse and meter
and fill the blanks with poetry.

You said a good poet works
with the grain of the wood
that made the paper.

You said the easy words are usually
bruised from the impact of their fall.

But there are words you must work for,
that you pick at their ripest, whose roundness 
meets your palm, without asking you to stoop.

You said the poems only release
their juices after hours of simmering,

with the earth’s spices, that themselves
must first be left to dry in the light of the sun’s eye,
forever beholding the broiling of other words.

You said poems are best appreciated at room temperature, 
or in whatever ambience they find themselves,

that they are excellent at regulating
the conditions of perception, 
to the worlds which they contain.

You said they are a salty elixir, making you thirst 
whilst cleansing your parched palate.

You can only know you’ve had enough
once you have already drowned.
Only then can we see the candescence 

illuming all the crayon-coloured outlines
the other side of our brittle and brilliant strokes.