A Gemini artist married to a Libra mathematician?
This will end badly, a relationship that defies regal ambition.
The naysayers laugh for we are opposite in many ways.
I can lose myself in my work and paint canvasses for days.
My libra mathematician likes statistics, it is his powerful tool.
I cannot understand algebra, statistics once made me a fool.
But we eat our beef, mashed potatoes with warm bread.
And we do not talk shop, so our marriage moves along ahead.
A Gemini artist married to a Libra mathematician is insane.
But we have been married for over fifty years so this is plain.
Although I despise math, and he does not cartoon, paint or sing.
We have many commonalities, and laugh at the same thing.
We raised three daughters who understood the beauty of this.
Depending upon the problem, they sought answers for their bliss.
Asking the Gemini when playing and whimsy was the answer they wanted.
If it was a logic question or a math problem, for Daddy they hunted.
Black art will never whisper
It comes with its own rhythm,
Feet tapping to the djembe,
Reminiscing of home.
It survives in the hands that bend color into opportunity,
In bantu knots of constellations
Marking where we have been and still left to go.
It croons on street corners
On canvasses, big and bold.
Every line spoken, every beat formed
Uplifts our coily hair towards the sun.
We honor the echoes
We hold the same truth
We are the sound.
Searching
for his palette
the painter
wanders on
Dreaming
of each color
to visualize
his song
Tubes of paint
lie scattered
unsqueezed
their caps remain
In attics
of blank canvasses
with images
— unframed
(Dreamsleep: July, 2025)
Page after page up in flames
of his first and last novel
For he just couldn’t get it right
though he tried with all his might
Canvasses of nocturnal life
he slashed them with a knife
For he couldn’t create them ex nihilo
couldn’t quite capture the moon’s pale glow
On the cusp of suicide
for all else he had surely tried
At last the searcher realized
The only masterpiece man needs
is the one recorded high upstairs
in ‘His Book of Good Deeds’
NOVEMBER MORNING
Look out, look out, you all!
The November morning,
Stunningly painted in the sky,
Like a canvas with white streaks
In the steel blue background,
Brightened by the sun, warming
The cold November morning.
The trees looking up to the sky
With their vivid green leaves
Swaying in the cold November breeze.
What a delightful sight!
Watching a November morning.
Changing the shapes of the white
Clouds, like different canvasses.
Amazingly wrapping you with warmth,
Awakening your senses, touching your soul.
11/5/22 Marilene Evans
Remind me of magical things
Enhance my joy, my being alive,
Tiny newborn babies who thrive
Precious jewels in golden rings,
Canvasses of sentient colors
Starlit skies of deep velvet hue,
Morning grass, shimmering dew
Fresh powder-sugared crullers,
Tiny bouquets of fever few
Bows of ribbon in curly hair,
Ballroom dancing with a flair
Old cards reminding me of you.
Written June 13, 2022
As with people
Art comes in all shapes
and sizes – colors and
shades, are the lenses
of distortion, while the lights
of revelation; textures are
our sniffing out, the soul like a
canine, on the scent of its
substance...
The novice starts with subject
or theme; while those more hearty
trust in the unseen Force of art –
stepping from its precipitous
ledge with mortal abandonment
free-falling, taken only pen
and brush in tow; pads, paints and
primed canvasses – all instruments of
of man's omnipotence
The Muse hollers, Nay!
While I say, work with me
or die, plummeting toward
the unforgiving bottom....
Broken Seashells,
canvasses of lobsters
tossed ashore by waves
are an open cemetery
with endless laments...
as green seaweeds
decorate them morbidly
if they were flowers!
I look around this beach
not frequented by a wanderer;
the strong stench of fish
is too unpleasant to sensitive noses,
but it's the perfect dinner
for those hungry gulls that swish
and land on their corpses!
Beer cans and water bottles
not disposed in nearby bins
attract rats with extreme hunger
and finding little, they chomp chasing after
the mackerels wiggling on the scorching sand;
oh, they happily feast on them and hiss...
keeping away the squeaking seagulls!
This abandoned beach once was
as pristine as the bluish water,
nobody littered it and people
walked barefoot seeking their favorite spots,
not getting cuts on fragmented seashells;
then hurricane Sandy came and left it desolate...
no souls returned to their homes,
and it became a ghost town forever...
and the few who stayed carried fright in their guts!
It is a dreadful burden to see
Life through the eyes of a poet
Rambling rivers become languorous heartbeats
Cloudless skies drawn as cerulean canvasses of god
Winter is now Summer’s slumber
Trees adorned in crimson and gold
A leaf forbidden to be mentioned
Age passing as endless regrets
Anger a fiery jab
Love an endless journey
Through the eyes of a poet
Life is an illusion of belief
A lair overflowing with undying drivel
The Poet comes to be a
Mysterious minstrel
A brooding lyricist
An ancient bard spinning voiceless quills
Through the eyes of this poet
I see you lying motionless
Time a forgotten companion
Your last breath forever abandoned
A ‘better place’ awaits
I can’t just say, you are
Dead
Through the eyes of a poet
A teardrop falls
Red and blue blending
into liquid purple build
spiritual tranquility;
violet energies
swirl into hues of
jubilation and unbound
elation,
euphoric ecstasy.
Lavender sprays
engulf the senses,
as nature paints her canvasses
with amaranthine song;
I breathe in her
fragrant love.
Heliotrope pinwheels
dot the horizon of my mind
and a kaleidoscope of
lilacs and orchids
intermingling
with purple irises;
fields of universes
inundate my soul;
I am renewed
in the amethyst magic.
PIECES
Life is a puzzled piece
Striding to fix our scattered equation
We're all fixing our lives
Because none was plain & made on arrival
To this galaxy called Earth
We all came to fix our puzzle
Torn before the face of nature
Our canvasses are now congested
From childhood innocence
With painting and hating,
Broken hedges and images,
With letters and fetters,
With stains and pains,
With scooped sheets of artistic work;
The imperfections of an artist, mortality of man.
Life is like an art mirror;
Check yourself, draw, paint yourself,
Design yourself, scoop yourself or screw yourself.
If I was a scattered face of aesthetic being
Would you find me, would you fix me?
Life is hard enough but we're tough enough
Zeal and zest not cast off.
We will fix our scattered souls,
To sail through until fulfilment.
VickWizzy
Art personified: Vick AdeDayo Manuel
https://mobile.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10217584107147269&id=1615647097&set=gm.2745950698750583&refid=18&ref=opera_speed_dial&__tn__=EH-R
Written by: Vick Manuel {VMP}
Copyright © July 31st, 2017
crowded canvasses
the aim
sincerity&truth
a certain perfection
in a fight
against convention
to open eyes
in amazement
poetry depicted
painted&portrayed
allegorized with passion
so prominent
in pure colour
as a footnote of their art
fresh hours
of wonder
smiles&signs
living images in the mind
infused
by an impulse
preoccupied
with
originality
these wild gleams
of fancy
in soaring imagination
on
the
wings
of the wind
This is a difficult time
For us to paint our desires
On unstarched canvasses
For the benefit of those
Who expect masterpieces
Discoloured and faded
Are our once green forests
Where we sowed seeds of dream-poplars
Amongst wet stones and ferns
Our fingers smudged with hope
Who would believe
We have burnt our doubts in flames of maple leaves
Who would imagine
We did a waltz under falling cherry blossoms
Who on earth knows we were syllables of a haiku
But I need your small hands
To lift straws
From storm-beaten haystacks
For me
To weave our effigies
It is the origin and hope of a thousand children, the love that transforms young seedlings to plants.
Its breath canvasses the woods of the Zaire o'er the hills of Zimbabwe down to the lowlands of the Mozambique.
It is the great tide that accompanies the Nile to kiss our cheeks at first light, the stars that glitter when the sun slumbers in celestial furlough.
Tis the bravery that enveloped the hearts of our forbearers, the burning lamp at the towerwatch of the Zanzibar.
It is the courage to walk the dark places in mythical lore. the strength that flows in Simba's pride.
It is the tongue of the Phoenix; the screams at slaver's bay. Tis the blistered feet of enslaved athletes at the diamond mines of sierra Leone.
Tis the very thread that weaves us in the roots of originality. It is the bowl that feeds all with kindness, the souls of a million bound in Porter's fellowship. Tis the spirits of my black martyrs
She is thunder and lightning;
powerful and serene,
terrifying and gorgeous,
cracking with white energy.
When she feels lonely she finds a blank canvas,
breaks him open looking for mountains,
hoping to see adventure and
adrenaline pumping in and out of veins.
When they leave, canvasses broken and torn and useless,
she is left an ocean of turmoil,
wind uselessly pushing through rain,
seeking warmth and love and life.
Her heart thunders and her eyes shine;
a storm trapped in a plastic container,
rage and nature,
terror and joy.
She is so much
and she has given up
trying to see it.
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