For my friends and family who share the periodic shadow of depression. Not all days are created equal….
Unseen
The barrage of advice
is endless. Use your brightest
colors, sharpest lines, be cheerful!
But eventually, we each must paint
with whatever colors we see, especially
on days like this, when your heart feels like a large
dead fish—cold and heavy and hard, when the air
has gone to syrup and all of space thickens
sinking down around your head like a dark
sheet drawn tight
and tighter
still
There are no yellows here no
gold. Today is a day for purples
and black, for indigo and blood-
red, for fat brushes marking wide sluggish
stokes over the canvas, of just trying to cover the cracks
and leave no white corners, no spaces, then signing
the work by pressing your face full-on
into the thick black paint in the
corner in the hope that you
might finally escape
this day
unseen
©Old Bones, New Snow/J.A. Fink 2014
