There are many kinds of artists – Somerville poet Kirk Etherton explains…

Kirk Etherton

To Be a Force of Nature
(for Denise Provost)

As an artist, one may resemble a
hurricane: some high-velocity breath
howling over rising seas and flattened
plains, making shutters shudder in
rhythm, banging exteriors, forcing

those inside to listen up and hunker
down; all around, the insufficiently
anchored may be disturbed, rattled
or quite fatigued (though hardly blown away).

Then again, there is the opposite,
non-bluster way: not a knock-down, drag-out,
pummeling huff & puff that makes the
Eleven O’clock News, rather those

organic growing, natural unfolding
compositions embracing quietly
evolved, evolving forms with rhyme &
reason; those that take their true, sweet time.

No need to force themselves, to grab or shake,
but rather grow, insinuate, reach up
and anchor downwards to manifest a
given shape. Rooted, branching, flowering,

expressing DNA-encoded stories
all: each like the single grass-blade working
through thick, steamrollered asphalt, or that
oh-so-curious, curious peach.

– Kirk Etherton

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