January 2025

My Painting

By Sally Currie
Posted: 09/26/2021

Contributed by Sally Currie

My life started as a blank canvass
On an easel shaped like the tree of life
Waiting for an artist to create
I am that artist
With many brushes
Some round
Some broad and flat
Some tapering to a fine point
All of the finest camels hair

From my palette I choose
The colors
Some dark and heavy that I spread
With a palette knife
For I have known great sadness,
Some pastel and airy, applied with a light touch
For I have known a rainbow of joys.
How long I have lived!
So many colors daubed on my canvass!
Some bring memories of love and adventure

For this a broad brush spreads reds and blues
Some bring memories of a childhood
Protected and loved –
A pointed brush paints spots of yellow sunlight
Amidst the green pastures of Grandpa’s farm.
Some bring memories of a father
Who verbally devalued me in my teens
Heavy brush strokes here in dark colors
Which fade very little with time.
A medium brush for gold and purple
Signifying things I have done
To make the world
A better place
Wherever I have lived
To prove my worth and ability.
These colors will endure after I am gone.

I did not mention regrets for I have so few
Here I use a narrow brush
Dipped in dull taupe or tan
Colors that will fade into the background
Of a life I consider will lived.