Green Peas at Stake

Art (Dew Drop 16)

Art

                    For a painting a friend sent me.

Old friend, you paint, so sad and sweet...
Why, those colors say everything, like silent reminders
on canvas, engraving my life, brushstroke by brushstroke,
to hint at what is lost, what no one sees.

If only your colors had a body I could dwell in...
one you could touch with your eyes as if
our skins could touch, like the day when I told you
I woke up from untamed dreams of childhood.

Yet, what came out of my lips has vanished
in the murky rush of years, and now, I find
my way with half-blinded eyes through your art,
and you hold my hand in remembrance.

When the real you reaches through in understanding,
I detect, in this icy life, some instrumentalist
drove us together to huddle around the only flame left,
not to chant nonsense but to pray for deeper perception.