You are made of springtime;

I long to paint those young red blossoms that you would call your lips.

My brush, perhaps, might linger there,

In a touch more tender than any kiss.

I steal the gleaming blue of your eyes to

Express that great expanse of sky,

And yet it is still not enough.

I want to leave them as they are,

Two drops of dew on petal skin.

I want to bless the canvas with your image.

And your hair! Ah, I wonder if

The fingers of Midas had brushed across it

Would he only mar its golden perfection
With metallic impurity?
It curls most exquisitely around the soft curve of your ear.

I will furrow my brow over every last sun kissed strand.

Every part of you sets my soul aflame with new ideas.

You are my Muse, and you wreck me so.

Is this passion of mine merely punishment for my newfound inspiration?

Every unkind word,

Every dismissive gesture,

Every expression of soreness or disdain,

Tears me a little more, and it

Spills onto my work in a most distastefully emotional way.

But when you are happy,

When you laugh and shake those splendid curls,

It is much worse, for my art is enveloped and swallowed in this love,

And the dreams I conceal, those frightfully beautiful

Visions of you that haunt me so,

They release themselves into the air,

And make their home in the bristles of my brush.

It is the greatest work I have ever done, but it mocks me so;

Does every line in the smooth white hands cry my adoration?

Do the curves of the neck scream my passion, revealing to all

That this is where I want to plant my kisses,

That this is where I long to rest my head?

I cannot tell.

Are you ashamed of it?
Does it pain you that I love you?

Sometimes the painter stains his own palette with his tears.

Oh! But it would bring a lovely flush to your cheek if you heard

The things I would whisper in your ear.