Week Three
Gilded Summer, Week Three
“The Hands of Time On My Skin”
Oil Paint, Layered Glass and Mirror, Gilded Frame
5” x 7”
This painting reflects the nature of time, how it holds and how it lets go.
An oak branch stretches across the composition like the hand of a clock, steady, weathered, inevitable. Cradled in its curve is a stillness, small, deliberate offerings once in motion, now gently surrendered.
Nearby, a portion of skin is rendered in detail. It is sun-soaked, injured, covered in fine hair, the skin of someone who has stayed long enough to be shaped by what they have touched.
It merges into the scenery yet never fully stays. Like much of what we love, it slips through but still we reach back, not to stop time, but to mark what mattered while it passed.
I chose my frame,
and a familiar color.
Over these past few weeks,
my skin has felt the change.
Scratched.
Bitten.
Sun-soaked.
I made it to the edge of the path,
to where the sky opened up overcast.
It was almost cold, yet bright.
There, my sweet flower waited.
With her I laid my quilt down,
and let the thick air wrap around me.
Honoring time,
I breathed.
Longer than I usually do.
And beside me, a fallen oak branch
reminded me of the hands of time
I dreamt of.
Too quickly they disappeared on me.
Just as they did for my dear caterpillar friend.
To let him not be so alone,
I took the sweet flower from behind my ear,
and gave her a place in the painting too.
Slowly,
I wasn’t looking.
Not really,
Just moving.
I noticed daddy long legs nearby.
He offered me one of his treats
from the black raspberry bush.
Gently,
I gave him my thanks,
and then returned to mix a deep, sweet color.
To let my friends in my painting have one too.
I then enjoyed my share.
It all circles back to the details.
Yet, even then,
so much slips through.
But, I gather what I can.
Believing it’s the small gestures
that add up to what’s most beautiful.
Maybe this is true.
Or maybe it’s how I cope with the reality of the hands of time.
The same that hands you face, as well.