If I Could Paint

If I could paint, I would speckle a canvas with raindrops on a car window and the city lights beyond, I would mix up the color of rusted train tracks under a harvest moon and six different shades of pebble-

If I could paint, I would do it at dawn or midnight and occasionally teatime, I would fake velvet and silk and polished wood and everyone would be a little fooled-

If I could paint, I would cover faces with faces and landscapes with cityscapes and I would forget to buy new canvas, I would sneak out late at night to paint tiny portraits on mailboxes and sidewalks and then think better of it and wash them off-

If I could paint, I would.