Zinnia Dreams

There are people who can make the desert bloom and faded hearts to flower. Such people have a gift ... and such people are a gift.

Crossroads

The sunrise was now far behind him. His journey was drawing to its end. The sunset in front of him filled the sky. The memories of things behind him began fading and he found most of his thoughts now converging on the setting sun. Before they utterly slipped from memory he recalled some of the paths he had taken to reach this point; some of the paths and some of the people he had met as their journeys intersected with his. He remembered the many crossroads with their dangers, toils and snares, and the paths he wish he had taken and the ones he wish he had not; the happy paths he chanced upon and the unpleasant ones he was glad to exit. He thought how long his journey had been. Some of the people he met walked on journeys far too short, at least in his opinion; but that really wasn't his affair. He only knew the length of his travel felt sufficient to him, and now that he had reached this lone and final path, that was good enough. He had ascended this crag and tail as long as seemed proper. He recalled how gentle and easy the rise was at first, with the sunrise imbuing everything with a rosy glow. Later the ascent at times became rough, with clouds hiding the sun; but there was no obstacle he hadn't either surmounted or found some way around. And now he was approaching the apex of the crag, the end of his journey, and he assumed the precipice would be be overlooking an unimaginably steep and dizzying abyss. The very thought of that abyss disquieted him and he stood still, wavering. It was then, though, he thought he could just make out, still far in the distance at the edge of the precipice and silhouetted by the sunset, a figure, a figure with arms outstretched toward him. He studied the figure for some time. Then, with a shrug and a smile, he sloughed off the last memories of what lay behind him and continued upward on his way.

Victoria the Victorian

I confess this may not be much, but Kathy ambled by when I was drawing it and said she liked the eyes. Since the eyes had Kathy's "aye," I thought I would post the piece.

At the Ascent

 It was close to twilight by the time the old man, now short of breath, reached the summit. From his vantage point he watched the leisurely advancing darkness gently blanket the surrounding countryside.

"When I was young," he thought, "oh so very young, I loved climbing hills. I was free as a bird then, without obligations. But, of course," he smiled, "my freedom was actually purchased by my elders, by their bearing obligations for me ... just as I would do in my turn with the next generation. And so the cycle goes.

"Freedom, though, it is such a word! To children it's unbridled play. To some adults it's a life free of responsibilities or repercussions; to scream but never to listen. To others it's a state of being, either guarded or crushed by society. But after all these years, after exploring all these crests and valleys, I believe I have found the true meaning of the word. Freedom isn't being unshackled from responsibilities, and it's not merely a state of existence. Freedom is a Person."

He lay down on the grass and peered up at the emerging stars. "Ah, freedom," he whispered, and closed his eyes.

A Winter Flower

She awoke from her rice paper thin sleep and fumbled for her spectacles, then carefully rose and made her way to the mirror. She stared, sighed, shook her head and spoke to her reflection. "I haven't seen so many wrinkles since the great shar-pei migration of nineteen-aught-eight." She smiled. Her husband would have liked that joke; he always appreciated her wit. But he'd been gone a long time and she just never felt like sharing her attempts at humor with anyone else. 

After her morning routine she settled in the rocking chair by the window, wrapped a blanket around her and watched the snowflakes lazily descend like white petals gently falling from a dying flower. Out there, buried beneath the snow, was her perennial garden. She stared at the few scraggly dead sticks piercing the snowdrifts. "They seem dead," she thought aloud. "Well, they are dead, they're just dead sticks now, now in winter. But, oh, how beautiful they were earlier this year! And even now the winter hasn't killed them, not really. The roots are still alive, they're just resting under the snow in the cold ground. Old blossoms are gone, but new ones are hiding in the sleeping roots, just waiting. No matter how many winters come and go the roots survive and they'll make new flowers once the winter is gone. Even in the dead of winter, when they all seem dead, the flowers live in the roots, just waiting, waiting for the spring. There are always flowers, even in the worst of winters; they're just waiting in secret, secure in the roots and waiting for the proper time to blossom." Satisfied with her rather rambling and repetitious oration, she wrapped herself more tightly in her blanket and began rocking, dreamily reminiscing about the seasons and flowers, her husband and herself. Then, smiling, she closed her eyes and slipped out of her winter and into the eternal spring.

A High-Handed Horse

There's nothing to this. It's merely the result of spending some time in the company of a pencil when neither of us had much to say.

Daedalus

The old man sat down next to me on the dune. We watched in silence as the waves lapped the shore and I hoped he would not break the spell by talking. Alas, it was not to be.

"It was near here," he sighed, "that I watched my son soar too near to the sun, saw the beeswax dripping from his wings, saw him flailing as he fell ... just as I saw my nephew fall when I hurled him down the cliff in a fit of jealous rage. Perhaps helplessly seeing Icarus die this way was a sort of poetic retribution. I don't know. After all these years, does it even matter?

"But as I say, I watched Icarus spiraling down, down, down. I watched the sea waves rising. I will swear to this day they were rising -- monstrous waves surging up to grab him, to swallow him up in the sea's ravenous, pitiless maw. I cried his name. It was all I could do, even though I knew he couldn't hear me above his own shrieks. And even if I could have reached him, his added weight would have been too much for my wings: we both would have plunged into the wine-dark sea -- we both would die.

"At that time, in that horrible moment, my eyes encompassed everything even though my mind comprehended nothing. I saw in the distance a quaintly garbed plowman cutting a furrow. Closer to the shore was a shepherd who seemed to be studying the sky, but in the opposite direction from my son. Oh, and there was also a fisherman who was also oblivious, or uncaring, to the fatal drama. None of the three gave the least notice to the spectacle above them. Later, in the sleepless nights, I would recall those peasants and somehow, I can't explain how, but somehow their very presence, their common, dull activities, made my Icarus and his whole adventure seen trivial, even absurd." And the old man bowed his head and fell silent.

I waited a respectful interval before replying. "I've heard of a man, perhaps you've heard of him also. His name is something like Pieter Brueghel. A fine man, or so I've been led to believe. It's certainly not my place to speak for him, but what I've heard of him makes me think he might be one to draw a lesson from your tale. Maybe its moral, if it indeed has one, is that the pretentious inevitably gives way to the real, and the high and mighty always seem risibly transitory when confronted by the common and lowly. After all, it is the poor in spirit who possess the Kingdom and the meek who will inherit the earth."

The old man gave no reply, but after several minutes he smiled. Then, without a word, he rose and walked along the shore of the wine-dark sea until he was lost to sight.

The Wayfarer

He watched the moon rising full and orange over the trees. It had been a long time since he'd been here. He wasn't sure, since it was so faint, but he thought he could just make out the rumbling of distant thunder. Or maybe it was the singing of the monsters emerging on the night mists. Either way, it felt good to be back. 

He sat on a wet, rotting log and absently picked at the moss and fungi. Somewhere out there, he couldn't recall exactly where since it had been such a long time, but somewhere out there sprawled the gargantuan ruins. Or maybe not. These woods always obliterated any human intrusion with spectacular quickness.  He smiled and thought, "Civilizations rise and civilizations collapse, but these woods, these strange, strange woods, they abide."

The rumbling grew louder and distinct. He now knew that it wasn't thunder; it was the monsters. Smiling again, he made himself as comfortable as possible and waited. It took a while for them to reach him. They were hideous and misshapen yet altogether beautiful in his eyes. He arose and warmly embraced each one of them in turn, each one of them once shunned by now-dead societies but welcomed by these everlasting woods.

"You've been gone a long time," gurgled one of the monsters.

He shrugged. "My being gone was then, but my being back is now."

"And here it is always 'now,'" replied the thing.

"Maybe so," the man thought. "Maybe there really are things that transcend time, so that 'today' and 'tomorrow' lack meaning, are swallowed up by 'now.'  Maybe, like their builders, the gargantuan ruins are gone now, gone like yesterday. But these creatures, these poor, detested creatures ... and these woods ... maybe they transcend time in an eternal 'now' where these creatures are beautiful, forever beautiful. And these woods ... well!" Then, smiling again, he joined the monsters in their song and walked with them into the night.

Only for Your Eyes

Sighing a contented sigh, he held her hand in his and, gazing lovingly into her eyes, whispered, "I have sailed through the silent seas between the ghostly shining dying stars. I have even wandered in the gloom of the prophet's twilight mountains with holy men and bards. With a horde of humble ghosts I have huddled as time's raging river rushed wildly by. I have traveled far in nameless places just to find sweet rest and comfort in the welcome of your eyes."

She studied him for a moment then rolled her eyes and replied, "Well, you're certainly waxing poetic ... with the emphasis on the 'ICK!'"

Later, as she slept, he dumped a bucket of ice-cold water over her head and walked back into the night.

Autumn Winds

They walked together in the twilight, arm in arm, down the boulevard and onto the bridge. She had never felt so happy. She glanced up at him, at his profile, and sighed with contentment. Oh, sure, as the years rolled by she'd find out all his irritating faults and foibles and would look at him clearly with both her feet on the ground; but that would be some faraway tomorrow. Now, right now, she saw him through a mist of joy. He was wonderful and perfect and she felt herself dancing among the emerging stars, free from gravity, free from everything except her love for this man. And they would be blissfully together as long as life endured. She smiled, so warm in her love.

And then the stranger approached.

She clutched at her beloved's arm in shock. Was that -- was that stranger real? No, he couldn't be! Although he wore his hat low she could see his face was wan, unnaturally wan with the paleness not of flesh but of a skull. And his eyes were so hidden in shadow that they looked like empty sockets. And in spite of his overcoat she could see he was thin, incredibly, impossibly thin. It can't be real! It's some sort of terrifying vision! And the figure kept advancing toward her. She tried to stop but found herself too weak to resist her unaware companion's steady gait. She tried to whisper her alarm but couldn't make a sound. All she could do was clutch her lover's arm even more tightly and stare at the advancing unreal figure.

And then, mere inches away from her, the figure politely doffed his hat and silently continued on his way into the growing darkness. A short while after he -- or it -- had passed them, she found her voice.

"That thing ... that man! Oh! Didn't you notice him?"

"No, not really," her darling casually replied. "I wasn't paying any particular attention to him. What about him?"

"Didn't you see how bleached his face looked, and how thin he was?"

He patted her hand. "Well, no. What about it, my dear?"

"'What about it?'" she cried. "Why, even with his coat on you could see he was little more than a ... than a walking skeleton! He was a skeleton ... a walking fleshless skeleton!"

He gently kissed her forehead and chuckled, "Well, there's no need to be distressed by that, my dear. It's not all that uncommon. It only means the poor soul is just not comfortable in his own skin."

She shoved him over the bridge and kept on walking into the gathering dusk.

Only Passing Through

The wanderer had no memory of his past (if, indeed, he had any past at all). In fact, he couldn't recall any time when he had not been lost in these woods. But he knew that somewhere beyond this dark expanse he must have a home, a place of calm and warm familiarity, peopled with friendly kith and kin. He had often tried finding his way back home, wherever or whatever that home might be, by the sun and the guiding stars in their courses. It was no good. All his attempted navigation brought him was an uneasy sense that he was straying farther from his home; that instead of escaping this strange forest he was plunging ever deeper into it. If only his surroundings weren't so confusing and overwhelming; it was far too easy to lose oneself forever in them.

Then, at twilight on a drizzly, windswept day,  he stumbled upon a crumbling high bank near a river. At its base was a cave almost undetectable by obscuring shadows and vegetation, and in the cave's farthest recess he could just barely discern ... what? ... could it be a door? He stood staring at it in wonder for some minutes until the ever-growing shadows of approaching evening roused him. 

He cautiously studied the thing in the shadows. Yes, he could make it out now, even through the overhanging vegetation and deepening gloom. It really was a door. How could a door be here, and who could have made it? He felt ... what? ... awe, fear, wonderment? So many emotions ... or instincts ... that he could not name. The door was deep inside the hollow, but from what he could see of it through the overhanging vegetation, he estimated it was roughly six feet tall and three feet wide and seemed to be made of pine. He then became aware of the scent of freshly-turned earth. That caused him to pause once more, although he could not understand why. He roused himself again, took a deep, shuddering breath, and clawed and shoved his way through the entangling roots and vines blocking the cave's entrance.

He broke through. The smell of turned earth was even stronger now. He strained his eyes in the darkness but was no longer able to see the door. Instead, where he thought it had been, where he could have sworn it had been, he now saw a figure. The wanderer stood transfixed, too amazed to be frightened. Somehow the figure was lighter, more distinct than it should be in the surrounding dark, as if it were somehow bioluminescent. The wanderer shook his head. The very idea was absurd. The figure was obviously human ... yet, it was visible in the darkness.

The two stared at each other for a minute or so. Then the figure reached out his hand to the wanderer and smiled. That smile! Even in the darkness there was something about that smile, something wonderful. The wanderer was caught in that smile like a child caught in his parent's loving arms. And then, with a sudden, rushing revelation, he understood. Now smiling himself, he happily realized he was home now ... finally, absolutely home. The figure's smile was the wanderer's home. He now knew it had aways been his home, even when he didn't know it even existed, it was always his home. "Home," the wanderer whispered unconsciously, "home, finally home!" He reached out his hand toward the figure's just as the mouth of the cave collapsed, sealing him off from the woods.

For to Such Belongs the Kingdom of God

 "And He took them in His arms and blessed them, laying His hands upon them."

Merry Christmas!

 May you have a most joyous holiday season!

Tongue-Cut Sparrow

This is another old drawing. One of Kathy's favorite folktales is "The Tongue-Cut Sparrow," so I drew this for her, along with some other drawings illustrating the story. The reason I selected this particular piece is that I recall how much fun I had drawing the anthropomorphic birds.

The Sculptor

There's not a thing to this: no bad pun, no story, no moral -- nothing. It's merely a fun little drawing done only for the amusement one experiences while taking an aimless stroll with a pencil.

The Little Cyclops

There's probably nothing more to this than meets the eye.

Synopsis

Happy New Year!

And yet another drawing done many years ago. With every new entry on this site I grow more doubtful that I'll ever post anything else, so this may be the last of its race. The sketch isn't much, but I guess I said what I wanted to say with it way back when, so I'll be content if this does turn out to be the last image. I just wanted to post something to celebrate the new year, and since I didn't have any recent doodles on hand I disinterred this one. I don't know if you can see it, but it has some water damage. I assume that means it will decay far faster than its sisters so I wanted to post it before it disintegrates. But all that is neither here nor there. All that really needs to be said about this piece is that I hope it brings you a smile. And, once more, Happy New Year! May this coming year bring you both many more smiles and very much laughter.

Profiles

Here's yet another old piece. I assumed, when I first disinterred it from a pile of ancient doodles, that I drew it for Sarah, perhaps as an illustration for some made-up fairy tale I would tell her at bedtime. The only trouble is the date on the back shows it was drawn when Sarah might have been a bit too old for such tales. So now I'm dubious that there is any reason behind this piece other than just the mere pleasure of taking a pencil for a walk, of letting it rove where it will. Besides, drawing just to draw, "art for art's sake" with no other goal or agenda behind it, is a wonderfully good reason for any drawing's existence. So it seems this drawing was only drawn for the fun of it. And a good thing, too, since I have no idea what story I would have had to come up with to go along with it.

Mnemosyne

"This place," I brooded, "all these people... forgotten, all forgotten." The cemetery stretched before me. There were countless fallen tombstones that, by nature's wry sense of either humor or poetic justice, were themselves all but buried beneath matted weeds. And the few monuments yet standing, pockmarked and lichen-encrusted, tottered at crazy angles, their epitaphs long ago eroded into illegibility. Wrapping my cloak more tightly about me as the dead leaves spiraled in the wind, I lifted my eyes from a fallen gravestone and saw the ghost gliding toward me.

"You look like someone lost in grave contemplation," he said with a smile.

I sighed. "Why is it," I thought, "that the worse a ghost is as a comedian, the more it wants one's attention?"

"Oh," I replied, more politely than I wanted to, "my thoughts are not too solemn, not really. But, after all, it is October, when the skies are 'ashen and sober' and the leaves are 'withering and sere,' so a certain small degree of wistfulness isn't to be unexpected. Still, my thoughts are far from melancholy."

His smile betrayed that he didn't believe me. "Even so, one mustn't forget that a time such as this, a place such as this, do seem to sadden one's thoughts."

"Yet you smile."

My attempted barb only made the dead thing chuckle. "Surely you do not think me an irreverent revenant?" 

I sighed again. "He has no intention of letting me rest in peace," I thought, and so I changed the subject to something I found quite curious. "What," I asked, "is that structure over that grave? It looks like a cage."

"Oh, that's a mortsafe."

"'Mortsafe'? What is that?"

"Ah! It's been obsolete for some time, so I guess it might be forgotten. Basically, it's a construction to prevent grave robbers from plying their trade. They were somewhat popular in the 1800s."

"The 19th century! But it's only a little rusted. Is it new?"

"Well," smiled the specter, "since its original unsavory purpose is forgotten, it does serve a new function, at least in this place, so it's still being made. Don't you remember?"

"Remember? Remember what?"

Now it was the dead thing's turn to sigh. "You don't remember. They never remember! As I said, originally the mortsafe was a sort of barricade meant to deter the living from defiling the dead. Now, here, it keeps us dead from defiling the living."

"'Us'?" I repeated numbly. "'Dead'?"

"But of course! You, me: the dead. Don't you remember what you are?"

"I... I'm... I don't..."

He took me by the hand and led me to the grave. "You," he said, "are a memory, only a memory now. Your survivors, if they recall you at all, should recall you in sweet memories. Instead, you relentlessly haunt them, my friend. You give them no rest, no peace. You keep digging yourself up and rob them of their present. Instead of being a sweet memory you are a suffocating obsession; and you know that's not right. After all, in memoriam in moderation."

I tried to understand, to remember. "So this structure once protected my body from others, but now..."

"But now?"

My confusion dissipated as all became wonderfully clear. "But now it protects others from me... well, from a morbid clinging to memories of me. It is my time, my place to be only an occasional memory to those on their side of the veil. I remember now!" 

And with that realization I climbed on top of the mortsafe and bade the ghost goodbye. He gave me one last smile as I wafted down through the iron grating, down through the heavy iron plate and down into the cold and comforting earth.

Waiting for the Cue

 I'm going through a moldering pile of drawings I have hidden away. This came from that stack. It was done in 2002. I'm not enthusiastic about it and, as always, earnestly hope I can do better than that now. Like so many other pieces on this site, the reason I'm posting it is that I recall Kathy saying she liked it. And now it's back to the moldering pile for this picture.