The Last Painting

 

The brushes kept slipping from his fingers.
Wind-tortured fields of wheat under darkened skies-
every brushstroke a nail.
The season's rustling hurry and the dusk
emotionless crows flap up to multiply
dun the wheat's gold and usurp the storm.
The blackened, infinite blue,
his palette's only suggestion of the primary;
red and yellow are plant and soil,
each decaying at the other's root.
And why the two moons? A starless night will come?
Is one a waning sun? When all else is clear:
grasses sprout darkly along the muddy path
that goes into the field to stop.
Or turns to go where the eye can't see.

Note: There’s some disagreement about whether this 

or Tree Roots was Van Gogh’s last painting. In terms

of content, this, Wheat Field with Crows, is the more

convincing candidate.

Tree Roots (Van Gogh), Sonnet #526

For years we thought Vincent Van Gogh’s

Last painting was “Wheatfield with Crows,”

With its dirt road lost among rows

Of autumn grain that wave and glow,

Crows flying wild, a beckoning

Toward dark skies and reckoning.

And now? These gnarled tree roots, exposed

By wind and rain, gripping the soil,

Image of the ageless, unposed,

Riotous like his mental moil.

His vision turned to the abstract,

The canvas stabbed with daubs or smears,

As though more paint would reveal fears

Clutched inside against his final act.

Note: For many years, Wheatfield with Crows

was considered his final painting. Recent

discoveries have indicated that Tree Roots

was in fact his last work. Though there are 

competing theories, the Van Gogh Museum 

in Amsterdam's official conclusion is that 

the painter committed suicide with a pistol

soon after completing Tree Roots.

My book of the first 200 of these sonnets is now available for purchase. Click here:

My Human Disguise.

The Night Cafe (Van Gogh), Sonnets #521 and #522

#521

Philosophers say you can’t prove

That two balls in a game of pool,

One struck by the other, will move —

That there’s no reliable rule.

There’s no assurance that today

What happened every time before

Will be repeated any more,

Just because it’s always that way.

I have to ask, how could they know?

Birds in flight could drop like rocks.

In a heat wave we could have snow.

Mountains could fall like building blocks.

My left ankle could turn to wood.

I’ll take my “will” over their “could.”

#522

Not pool, a game of billiards:

A ball struck a ball, two rails, 

And another ball kissed —

Then money changed hands. 

The fool stares at the chalky bed

Where his future sleeps.

Two men rub their ears, 

Hunched beneath vague hats;

Elbows banging the table,

They want their cold beers.

A thief with a glass weeps,

Overhearing old lovers;

When he has downed his gin

The murdering will begin.

My book of the first 200 of these sonnets is now available for purchase. Click here:

My Human Disguise.