Watercolors
signed N. Bird, 1967.
A pile of watercolor painting tied with string
and I begin to barter for them
as though they were meant for me,
these unframed 10x16 giant holy cards,
holy cards sans halos, saints, enraptured faces.
I see the holiness of bare and bark-white trees.
They breathe in their nakedness and make
the winter winter.
They are watered by a stream that dreams
of resting soon in ice,
if the washy gray-green clouds are true.
I believe they are.
I know the likeness isn’t perfect.
Perhaps the sycamore (we call the button-wood)
should thicken toward the base,
be more deeply furrowed.
But I believe this watercolor world. I see
there is no bird, no red of hope, no cardinal
quiet in the branch, not even a blackbird wing
to take us into spring before the hardest freeze.
If only I knew how to stand the cold, and wait,
and paint that kind of white,
that true and lonely blue.
Jane Vincent Taylor
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
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