In the process of packing for my latest move I was able to excavate one of the better poems I've written, something I figured had been lost long ago (ok, not that long but it sure feels it).
In the summer of 2003, following my second year of university I went back to Cape Breton as I'd done the summer before. That summer I'd worked for the Cape Breton Post and this time I wanted to do something different. So I enrolled for two courses at UCCB - one on children's lit and another devoted to play writing. They were both totally up my alley and this was back in the days when I was actually still a good student. I aced them both.
Play writing was great and helped reignite my passion for creative writing and really was one of the major events to set me back on that path. We did lots of cool things and maybe some day I'll talk about more of them but for the purposes of this post I will just mention one. We walked through UCCB's art gallery and were each told to select one painting to write a poem on (it may not have just been poems, there could have been other options but as a poem is what I did it's what I remember).
I picked one by an artist named Noah Schwartz simply called "Untitled". I can't remember for sure but I think it was painted in 1979. Anyway, like many paintings out there this wasn't really a straightforward picture of something. I guess it was what you might called "semi-abstract". I can't really see it in my mind now but there were harsh lines and faint colours, lots of white, brown and maybe some pale blue and black. I just can't remember. Anyway, here's how I saw it that day.
Noah Schwartz's 'Untitled'
Modern meets ancient here
it's windswept, sun-bleached, now stripped and
sand-blasted
There's something so much older...underneath
Scaffolding against the cliff-face
archaeology uncovers secrets in the canyon
slowly but surely they scrape to meet them
Noon. The sun is high and there are
shadows cast against the rock
Men in boots and dusty fedoras come in the day with their
tools; their instruments of history
They swig their water, unroll their canvas
and chip away
They come in the day and shade their eyes
wipe their brows
what is ancient is not easily given up
The men leave at night
many secrets remain, elder gods are the most protective
This place is old
