Canvas

The canvas starts as blank
With a touch, first from sweet milk
and grease from an elbow rough as stone
it begins to change.
Color is added, with a rough punch
a bitter touch,
the picture adjusts
with every finger every brush
from those who gently dust
and those who press the whole palm in.
It morphs, it moves, this image
until the day you finally complete it.
You hang it for all.
For those who have once passed by
and those who have never touched it at all
to pause a while, and gaze in wonder
at the wreckage or the beauty of the image
you've left for others to ponder on.