Albert Huffstickler: "The Way of Art"

It seems to me that
paralleling the paths of action, devotion, etc.,
       there is a path called art
       and that the sages of the East would recognize
       Faulkner, Edward Hopper, Beethoven, William Carlos Williams
       and address them as equals.
       It's a matter of attention and discipline, isn't it?—
combined with a certain God-given ability.
       It's what you're willing to go through, willing to give, isn't it?
       It's the willingness to be a window
       through which others can see
       all the way out to infinity
       and all the way back to themselves.




"The Way of Art" by Albert Huffstickler. Text as published in Why I Write in Coffee Houses and Diners: Selected Poems (Authors Choice Press, 2000).

Art credit: "Delicate Arch, Arches National Park [Utah]," photograph by Thomas Piekunka.