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it’s hard

things aren’t easy

“easy to say and hard to do” “nothing comes from nothing” and all that

but what does it really mean

anyone who’s built a house or a complicated computer program from scratch knows

and may be able to tell you if you can listen

a good artist and each person who dares to create something that never existed

or change something carefully to make it better

knows too

it means starting with nothing but an idea and starting with not knowing but believing you can figure it out

and building from that one piece and one fact at a time

and learning how to fit each piece each fact with another

over and over

day after day

and make mistakes and care enough to see them

and fix them

and learn

and not make mistakes but stand back and want to make it even better and do some parts again until you know they’re right

day by day one piece one fact married to another

sets of facts and pieces put together to make bigger pieces and one assembly married to another

building and building

until you’re done

and your idea works just like you knew it would

from A Graduation — 6 spontaneous poems — Bill Eberle

June 12, 2013

© 2013, Bill Eberle