Lament for a Painter's Boy

Lament for a Painter's Boy

He liked colors, he always had. He liked fall particularly when the leaves would show their reds, yellows and golds and begin dancing on the wind.

Then he discovered paint and the power that would be made when he put brush to canvas. Emotions were formed then. Anger, hate, love, happiness swirled together in the form of pictures and the canvas pulsed with life. He knew what colors, what emotions, to put together to create harmony, to create life. To create something that would speak to the onlookers and tell them something they wanted to see, and more deeply, feel. But at the same time he knew what colors not to put together, not to even touch. The wrong combination of color could rip out the heart, the very soul of the painting’s admirers, and destroy life. So, he never put forbidden colors together, never let them touch, no matter how hard life played on the heart strings of his soul.

Everyday he painted. Painted in his little hut with its red thatch roof and its garden that exploded in color every month of the year. People came from miles around to watch, to marvel, to request. They named him the Painter and he became legend.

The Painter watched the seasons turn and painted them with a slowly graying hand. Every day the Painter stood in front of his mirror and watched as the colors of himself slowly faded away. One night, as the bright stars beat through the windows of his house and glinted off his silvery hair, he rose from his bed and stood looking out at the pin pricks of light in the dark sky. He looked at the October moon bathed in a deep orange glow and at the lake reflecting the yellows and whites of the stars in ever shifting patterns. And he put his head in his hands and wept because he knew that he would not be able to paint for much longer.

Shortly after this, as the months changed and the Painter’s hand began to grow weak and wobbly with age, the boy came.

He came quietly, sneaking through the Painter’s garden. The flowers had on their fall colors, their oranges and reds, and blew harmoniously together in the wind as the boy moved among them. Every now and then the boy would snap a green stemmed rose here, a red blossomed mum there, and formed a bouquet in his hand. The Painter watched him from his window and marveled, for the boy was forming a painting in his hand. A painting with flowers where the golds complemented the reds and the oranges did not over power the browns. The Painter watched the boy choose his colored flowers as quickly as he himself would choose paint and immediately all became clear.

He ran out of his house as quickly as he could and caught the boy by his shoulders before he could escape. And there in the garden, in front of the many colored witnesses he made the boy his apprentice, to paint for him when he could not. And the boy became his apprentice happily for he had no family of his own and not much of a life to return to. So he stayed with the Painter in his red thatch hut and garden of color and learned to paint with the power of color.

All through the cold winter he learned to paint. Learned how to move the brush just so to create sadness and learned how to combine colors to create jealousy. And most importantly he learned how not to combine colors to produce the forbidden combinations. The Painter stood behind him watching with a pleased eye and a gentle, instructing voice. In the smoky kitchen the boy painted dried herbs, still smelling fresh from summer, he painted the cold white snow that blanketed the land in warm snug comfort. And in that kitchen the boy became the Painter’s boy and painted for the Painter when he could not.

Winter turned spring, spring turned summer, summer turned fall and another year past. The boy’s skill grew and the Painter was proud. When the winter melted into spring once more, the eye of the Painter’s boy began to wander from the little hut with its red thatch roof. He would sneak from the hut when the Painter would take his naps, and journey to the village. There, he would set up easel and canvas and begin to weave emotions in paint. He swirled together pinks, tans, browns and blues and people appeared on the swath of white. A stroke of brown there, add a touch of black and there was a building.

People slowed on the street to watch the boy paint. Women tittered in awe behind large jeweled fans and men in long coats approached the boy with gold jingling in their palms. The boy did not notice. He was the painting and the painting was him and nothing could separate the two. Only when he lay down his brush and gave a great sigh, did the people surge foreword. Offers were made and harsh words were exchanged but the boy heard none of these. For when he saw the crowd and the people he grabbed the canvas and ran in fear, leaving his paints behind in the dust.

The boy told the Painter what had happened, quietly, sheepishly afraid of his masters reaction. But to his surprise the Painter laughted a glowed with pride for the boy was carrying on his legacy. He would live on forever in the paints and canvas of his boy.

The seasons turned once more and in the red thatch hut and garden of color the boy grew into manhood. It was on the day he decided to paint the mill, paint the water swirling and the colors made by the dancing light, when he met the girl. She stepped out of the light into his painting and so became his life. Many days they sat together under the lush green trees. Many days he painted her and love flowed from brush to canvas in a constant stream of passion and emotion.

Then the wars came and the sky turned red. Soldiers came down from the great city and marched in straight stiff rows of greens and browns. The Painter’s boy spent many days painting them and weaving in the passions of war. The girl also spent many days with them and many nights as well and when the soldiers marched west into a reddening sky the girl went with them, professing love for a soldier with out a face or name.

The Painter’s boy noticed her absence and his hear longed for her. Longed for her sweet smile and clear innocent eyes. He searched their old haunts unceasingly, looking for her, reminding himself of her. Then he found out. Whether the wind whispered it to him in the darkest hour of the night or whether a bystander, saddened by his ceaseless searches, told him, it was unknown. But he found out she had left him.

The world turned black, then red as his anger grew. He ran to the hut then, to the canvas and to the paints and behind him the trees wilted and the sky cried. Every lesson he had learned from the Painter was thrown to the wind and the boy picked up his brush and began to paint with pure passion and emotion. Hurt, anger and sorrow swirled together in color and forbidden combinations were created. But the boy, blinded by emotion, did not even see what was forming on the swath of white before him. Finally he finished and looked at his painting for the first time, at the colors and the forbidden combinations and the brush slipped from his fingers and clattered on the blue grey stones below.

The crickets were out and chirping the first time the Painter called him. His voice echoed hollowly over dark hills, the lake and the garden but there was no response. And there would be no response but the Painter did not know that and kept calling until the moon rose. Then the Painter hobbled in search of his boy.

The same stars that hung over his head the night he wept so many years ago, watched over him once more as he made his way slowly, shakily down the walk. He was old now. His hair had long since turned silver and a full snowy beard now fell from his chin and his walk was slow and painful. But his eyes were as sharp as ever and he saw with clarity the pile of cloths and flesh on the old bluish grey stones. He saw the brush, still loaded with paint and the palette, a sticky mess. He saw the easel and didn’t need to see the canvas to know what had happened. He approached slowly then, with tears streaming down his old wrinkled cheek. He stood and looked at the boy, at himself, and he looked at the heavens and cursed them. Cursed them for taking away his pride, his extra hand, his second self. The Painter became quiet again and looked at the bluish grey stones and brush at his feet. And so, the Painter picked up the brush for the last time and painted. With his eyes closed so as not to be destroyed by the angry colors, he painted blues over blacks, greens over reds and transformed the boy’s painting into something more. With the last bits of his strength he painted, the last remnants of his life and when he finished the brush slipped from his lifeless fingers and clattered to the blue grey stones below.

And, left behind in the slowly lightening sky was the boy’s painting, forever changed. The Painter’s grief, wishes, desires and those of his boy were placed permanently in paint to stand forever for all to see, for all to witness, this Lament of a Painter for his boy.