Absorbed in landscape,
My morning passed quickly
Into early, yellowing cottonwoods,
Bright sun warm on my back,
The west hills, dry land,
Fields yet green--unharvested,
Maples, orange, red and mauve,
The endless green and ocher
Of the roadside,
And the dull blue-green-gray-gold
Of autumn sage,
All translated--preserved
With the flick of a brush.

Still, like all translation
It is labor--
That thoughtful, process
Of choice,
That constant undertow
Of critique,
That worried yearning--hope
For the end result,
And then the Magic,
Of stepping into that scene
Now too captured on canvas.

09/24/2014

Author's Note: . . . just beyond the dairy to the west, looking westward down the road and out to the valley.

Posted on 10/05/2014
Copyright © 2025 Leonard M Hawkes