Spring

I am a wallflower in the online writing community and occasionally I see a sentiment that I can empathize with:

I am always the poet, never the poem.

To put it in plainly, writers who take their loved ones and craft them into beautiful prose feel self-pity (envy?) that they themselves have never been written that way. They yearn to be the muse. They desperately wished to be so loved that someone else is driven to creation.

And to all of them I wish to say one thing:

You are not paying attention.

Art is humanity’s attempt at giving form to feeling. Poetry, stories, music, paintings, drawings, sculpture, photography, performances… All of it. A human is taking the ephemeral and making it tangible. Like tiny little gods. It is a beautiful thing to witness.

Artists, writers, creatives, etc do not have a monopoly on creation. Not everyone has the means or ability to make art in the way that it is conventionally defined.

The cake that your mother bakes you on your birthday is art. That cake would not exist if she didn’t love you. Your friend taking you to see a musician that you like is art. That memory you share with them would not exist if they didn’t love you. Your cousin smiling when you video chat her after months is art. That smile would not exist if they didn’t love you.

Humans are constantly creating and it is often in service of someone else. Pay attention. You are seen for the poem that you are and the witness is doing their utmost to show you what they see.