When I get the inevitable question again and again from those in the know I want to be able to say "yes I have started painting again."

The canvas lies stretched on the sofa in the way of someone who maybe sought to sit but for the moment I was not worrying.  Sometimes I would fret about the spiderweb rivulets in the glass panes or the dust on the windows, or the cracks in the plaster; but right now with the snow falling lightly outside and bubbling water in the fish tank I could regard the placement and blankness of the canvas with little enough anxiety to consider loading the brush up with paint and slathering the greedy canvas.

I just now started painting again and soon will fill up the glass and drink and paint and paint and drink until, in fading light and through one squinted eye, I will keep brushing and slicing and watching the image bleed like thick red blood out the jugular vein of the muses neck.  And awaken the next morning my tongue a lustrous bile carpet and a throbbing regret a singing dentist's drill in my mind, at least having painted.  At the very least having painted.