Coloring Book

 Each picture is heartbreakingly banal,
a kitten and a ball of yarn,
a dog and bone.

The paper is cheap, easily torn.

A coloring book's authority is derived
from its heavy black lines
as unalterable as the ten commandments
within which minor decisions are possible:
the dog black and white,
the kitten gray.

Under the picture we find a few words,
a title, perhaps a narrative,
a psalm or sermon.

But nowhere do we come upon
a blank page where we might justify
the careless way we scribbled
when we were tired and sad
and could bear no more.

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