the painters

Hemingway painted his walls

red with a 12-gauge

not a paintbrush

i guess it got hard

getting colors right

with the bulbs all burnt out

on the bright side

head empty from

words stamped

by ribbonless

typewriters

you can tell

a great one

by their eyes

alone

out

on the frontlines

of an endless war

fought

for a peace of mind

no,

the mad ones

are never really there

maybe that is why Hemingway

and Cobain

and so many others

picked up painting

in the end