Berty's First Masterpiece

One thing I know; art, in some form, is part of my Calling. In the last couple of years, I have found the creation of visual arts come more naturally to me than performance or language arts. While I have an ear for language and music, preparing songs and writing papers are both more tedious and sometimes downright aggravating than making something uselessly interesting with my hands. When I get my hands onto a creative project--drawing, molding, and, now, painting--I am unaware of passing time. Sometimes I don't even realize I've got to pee. When I snap out of creating mode my first thoughts are usually, "Man! I've got to go!"

When this last summer began, I played with the exciting idea of trying to write poetry. I read Ted Kooser's "A Poetry Home Repair Manual," and even played with some words in my journal. Now I know many years and experience will pass if I ever consider writing poetry again. Kooser helped me realize I like reading, hearing, and reciting poetry, not writing it. However, I approach visual arts with the same mysterious excitement I had for poetry at the beginning of the summer. I would rather paint poems.

My first masterpiece is about a peach, orange, and lime, sitting cozily together on a pink and white table cloth. Since it is only 6" long and many other poets--all those in my Painting I class--have created something similar, I doubt it will ever be published. Of course, I plan for many masterpieces to follow; today I purchased canvas for future compositions. I bought two canvas boards: one for the project my teacher assigns, and one for the poem I assign.

I believe I may work with trees. The poetry I've been reading this summer is by Wendell Berry, collected in his book, "A Timbered Choir." Berry will never be one of my favorite poets, but since it is the first book of short poems I have ever posessed, I am reading and enjoying it. Unfortunately, I have not yet read enough to qualify the first half of my last sentence. I find, nonetheless, that any poem of Berry's that I like is bound to mention trees (not surprising, considering the collection's title).

1988; II

It is the destruction of the world
in our own lives that drives us
half insane, and more than half.
To destroy that which we were given
in trust: how will we bear it?
It is our own bodies that we give
to be broken, our bodies
existing before and after us
in clod and cloud, worm and tree
that we, driving or driven, despise
in our greed to live, our haste
to die. To have lost, wantonly,
the ancient forests, the vast grasslands
is our madness, the presence
in our bodies of our grief.

1989; VIII

One day I walked imagining
What work I might do here,
The place, once dark, made clear
By work and thought, my managing,
The world thus made more dear.
I walked and dreamed, the sun in clouds,
Dreamer and day at odds.

The world in its great mystery
Was hidden by my dream.
Today I make no claim;
I dream of what is here, the tree
Beside the falling stream,
The stone, the light upon the stone;
And day and dream are one.

Wendell Berry

Of course, I do claim the right, as an absent-minded artist, to paint something other than trees; never expect me to follow through with anything I say.