I continue to struggle between writing and art, fiction and poetry, but it's coming together inside my chaotic mind. Although I read a chapter from a novel I started a year ago or more when I was at my writers' group yesterday, I didn't wake up this morning with the itch to work on it. Instead my creative mind clamored for poetic lines, reading and writing them. I need the intensity of getting a moment or story into a few brief lines. The brevity of poetry, especially haiku, seems to deepen the reader's response to the thoughts the writer has expressed. But also my fingers itched to hold a brush or watercolor crayon and smear color across a canvas. I need the visual illumination of the words I write to feel complete. And so I journey deeper into the work of poetry and deeper into the process of art journaling. I keep moving ahead, reading more and more poetry and more art books, especially books on art journaling. I collect more poetry collections and more art supplies. As I sit in my craft room playing with color and listening to music I feel free and at peace. Why resist that?