nature

Hope

A bird sings in deep December; its persistent serenade coaxes morning into dark. What memories of summer nectar fill its trilling head? What longing for lilting spring breeze floods its swelling chest? Here, where heavy, settling layers weight our hearts in sleep, a singular bird refuses to notice, to succumb. It rises before dawn and…Read more Hope

Give a Heart Gift

My 16-year-old son wanted to surprise a special-someone with flowers. The problem – he was flat broke with no money-earning opportunities even on the horizon. Thinking quickly, I offered a suggestion. His expression at first registered disbelief, then utter scorn. “I am absolutely serious!” I argued. “Think about it!” After a few minutes, he disappeared…Read more Give a Heart Gift

Painting a Place Beyond

I discovered this week that writing about the American/Vietnam War stirred up a torrent of scary emotions. I often “think” in feelings, not words or even images, but currents of emotional energy. After I wrote certain phrases, they tossed around in my head like a bare branch in the wind. Then, as I reflected further,…Read more Painting a Place Beyond

Held

I am battered, a bereft leaf loosed in murky mayhem, kicked up by frenzied heels Of moon and wind. No mooring remains in this, last corkscrew hour before dawn. I am a burnished shadow, a swirling swan song to inky nihility. Falling. Suddenly! Madness slivered, snagged in the hem of earth’s evergreen garment, quivering on the…Read more Held

Into the Light

Dense, opaque tendrils curl, clutch me captive. I wither in the cruel confines of this grasp. When suddenly, inexplicably, the darkness reels back upon itself, cringing. Light flung like glitter, gleaming like oil on water, unveils the secret of this murky prison cell. The mystery of the darkness – myriad colors warped, bound so densely as…Read more Into the Light

Footprints of the Unseen

When fire flings its last defiant spark and torrents of leaves crackle with laughter, I wonder if you are dancing on this flaming air? Here, on this hillside of memories, where dreams are laid to rest like carpets of gleaming leaves draped over stones. I am untethered, adrift, lured to the last place you touched. You were…Read more Footprints of the Unseen

Progression of a piece – Songs in the Dark

There is an idyllic perception of the artist, wiling away hours in beauty and serenity. Paint streams from garden paths of the mind. Birds sing, sun shines - effortless flow. Perhaps this is the experience of some creatives. It is not a familiar space to me. Almost every piece I begin thrusts me onto a precipice…Read more Progression of a piece – Songs in the Dark

Songs in the Dark

Sometimes darkness presses in all around, suffocating, like the hazy veil of smoke from a nearby wildfire. It irritates our eyes, catches in our breath, and coats everything in layers of black soot. But we are able to hold it at bay, just beyond the ragged edges of our being. We figure out how to…Read more Songs in the Dark

Sojourn

Something autumn seeps among these grasses. Rooted, fettered - bodily, as through me treads the sky. Pressed to this leaden veil, geese consume me there, suspended in their hollow, longing call. Oh, ponderous song! Where the way through? Take flight! if I could, neither north nor south -