The old timers
would sit on porches
rocking silently
in the gentle breeze.
Hoarding the few golden
drops of heat
from the waning sun
like misers.
Staring into the cold days ahead,
looking forward
to the cold Winter nights
swarming like moths
around the hearth.
Companionship and longing,
lost loved ones
and some left,
the warmth of closeness
and the cold of timeless distance.

Everybody else (the young and able),
worked storing away
the winter stock
getting ready
for the long, dark cold.

In the forest
alone with the light
and the shadows
was the Painter.
Only he saw
he hidden colors
of the moment,
the shadows
nobody else would see.
His art, his love and joy
was to open people’s eyes
to the beauty he saw
in mother nature’s being.
He just wanted to show
If only they wanted to see.
© btk. 1/20/88
Roberto Isaza