SpringJazzLandscape
Image size 66 x 80 inches, oil on canvas

FreeJazzAbstraction
Collaboration at SUMMERFOLK
"Yea though I walk through the valley of banjos
I will fear no evil, for I have my tenor sax to comfort me"
Kenny Baldwin
with Peter Beckett on canvas


standing in for the hero
for the first painter to
speak to me of searching
his friend in jazz
the fearless improvisor

cutting fire-wood
has turned to
sculpting
with earth and trees and
emerging pathways

scattered stacks of wood
melting snow
the first of the wild leaks
emerging now

I started painting in the woods
one spring years ago
after returning from a
winter in Santa Fe
where Alice in the cowboy bar
read to me from the enteogical arguement
horizons appeared in all directions

space-time

luckily there's work to do outside
luckily it's spring
luckily i spent a winter living in a little wooden sailboat

and painting outside
the birds keep me company

The winter winds and
weight of snow
have selected trees
for firewood now.
Meltwater
from rocky slopes above,
spring's pools and
streams begin.

Spring

walking amongst the maples
there's a quiet music
to the rhythm of sap dripping
into recently emptied pails