A few months ago my friend Isabel Navarro Sánchez told me that she had nearly finished writing her new novel. Would I allow her to use one of my paintings for the cover of the book? Well, of course, and with pleasure and gratitude.
The Silence of The Willow (El Silencio del Sauce), with its intriguing cover, arrived in my California mailbox a couple of days ago. The novel begins with a woman who disappears and continues as a story about daughters and mothers, about secrets, jealosies and vengeance, where home is not a haven, nor a refuge, but a place of menace and danger.
It has not yet been translated into English, but I’m enjoying the shadows and suspense and I’m sure Spanish speakers who love elegantly written mysteries will enjoy reading it too.
Green Song 4: Benediction – Watermedia & pencil – 8 x 11 in.
You don’t have to imagine where home is any more than you have to imagine the dirt under your feet. You’re standing on cement or asphalt? Jump up and down a couple of times. You’d prefer more solid evidence? Well, in April, the crew of Artemis II on its voyage from earth to the dark side of the moon, sent us photographs of a blue sphere spinning in the immeasurable darknes of space: photos of Earth, their home, your home too, my home, our home.
Where in the photos is the border between Russia and Ukraine? Between Israel and Gaza? Can you see Washington, Tel Aviv or Moscow? How about a forest or a freeway, or a house? Even less visible is a white-haired man in a little town near the edge of an ocean. He’s in the last chapter of a long life and for months he has been drawing the flower a friend gave to him in December. At that time, the gift was a brown sphere with two green sprouts emerging from its crown. But it grew, and to his surprise, he grew as well.
At first the flower was an “it.” Then in March it became a “she.” In April she became a “you.” And the artist who draws the “you” is not the same as the one who saw only an “it.”
Most flowers bloom in Spring and wither in Autumn. You opened your arms during the dark days of Winter. You never seemed as lovely and full of grace as when you began to wilt. Now your green has turned to brown and your petals look like shrivled butterflies. Sleep well in Summer and bloom again when rain and snow return. I’ll be here at home and welcome you with brushes and colors.
GreenSong 3 – Pencil, ink, and water media – 8.5 x 11 in.
As the days of March grew warmer in the foothills, we began to forget Winter. Winter, however, did not forget us. “Spring,” we laughed when we awakened to the songs of birds we had not heard since October. “False Spring,” we sighed as our days and nights turned white and cold again.
This flower, a gift from a friend, ignored the winds and white drifts piling up against the windows. On the coldest days it seemed to grew taller. Green fingers sprouted, searching for light. Every day I contemplated it, listened to it, drew it.
Years ago when I used to offer classes at the college, I would suggest to my students that drawing is not only the act of seeing, of observing with our eyes whatever the subject might be: flowers, clouds, skin, whatever. But drawing is also an extension of our fingers, as if we were touching the subject, embracing it. What I have lately been learning from the flower is that drawing can also be an extension of our ears. During these weeks of companionship, the flower and I seem to mirror each other; I oberve it, it observes me. It listens to me, I listen to it. To my surprise, the flower sounds like it is singing.
Do you remember when as a child you first held a conch shell to your ear and were amazed to hear the sounds of the sea? The flower makes a sound like that, like a sound light would make if we could hear light. No, no, I thought, I must be mistaken, flowers don’t sing. The amazing sounds are only feathery whispers of snow piling up against the windows.
