Regina Cherry
Originally published in The Evergreen Review Issue 104 in 2001.
Angels with blackened wings
mortals with uncertain hearts
trembling
trembling with fear and shame
anger, strain and emotion
excitement pain
heat and cold
expectation
love a sigh's memory
shiver through caged hearts
exhaled without thought yet
welling up again and again
smoldering
lost embers in cold fire
cadmium orange vermillion
camouflaged by white frosted
gray
Fred's green vermillion
orange paintings cryptic
layered layered the trace
in name only - the memory
each of his paintings
a monument tombstone
to a lost memory unknown
to him six million plus
strokes of boiled
oil-resin paint
on which he burned
his hands
tonight
I finally see
your paintings
