When in Doubt, Create Art

I stumbled across yet another forgotten poem tonight while I was searching desperately for inspiration and debating whether or not to write about my college essay on nationalism and its relation to current world politics.  Yeah, thank goodness for the poem…

A river of blood dapples my path;
Scarlet flakes of fallen promise
Cruelly wrenched from balding branches
In the unforgiving winter wind.

How came I thus to travel this road,
So laden with pain and gory portent?
“It is your burden,” speaks the silence.
And despairingly I plead, “Why me?”

As with the last poem, I don’t remember why I wrote it or what inspired me then.  Unlike the last, however, I do understand what I was saying.  We all feel like this from time to time – certain that we are alone with nothing good ahead of us, but with no other path in sight.

My answer is first that you must put one foot in front of the other.  The only way to get off the hard road is to get beyond it.  And secondly, try to find a beauty hidden in the horror of the moment.

However tortured I thought I was at the time that I wrote this, I must have been captivated by some red leaves strewn across my path, and I was inspired to create some little work of art.  That’s all it takes to refocus yourself away from your doubts and fears.

I promise you’ll be stronger if you can create art from your fears.

What are your thoughts?