Margaret Mair
Echoes
Colored pencil on paper
Response

Insanity at the DMV
By Diane Mayr
Inspiration piece

Having my picture
taken over and over
and each time
expecting to see
someone else.

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Lisa Kilhefner
Inspiration piece

Let Me Nestle
By Margaret Mair
Response

Let me nestle
In these soft curves,
Hide in these hazy hollows,
Bask in this mellow light,
Burrow into these
Darkened shadows,
Look out through these
Translucent surfaces;
Let me see
The world differently,
Through filmy layers
Curved and mottled
And streaked with
Life-giving red.
Let these lenses
Show me fresh hues,
Soft and quiet colored,
Like the fertile earth,
Like sun warmed skin,
Like the glowing pulse
Of life.
Let me pull
These gathered shapes
Apart
And wrap them round
My exposed being
Like a gentle blanket;
Let me immerse myself
In their spirit
And sink through
Their soft layers
Out of sight
But not
Out of mind.

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Margaret Mair, Into the Deep Red Heart of the Wood, Acrylic on canvas.

Response

Reclaimed

By Michelle Wallace

Inspiration piece

Scrape deep, chip away

Remove the years of grime

Expose the raw material

Intended for a different purpose

Splinters tear the flesh

That lovingly strokes,

Pouring lover’s blood

Into the restoration

Ragged and rough as sandpaper-

Yet the lightest touch is fire,

Salt in the open wound

Painful purification

Smooth over reclaimed surfaces

Kissed with sweetest silk

And gently unveil

The undiscovered me

Margaret Mair, UnderWater, Acrylic on canvas

Response

Hawaii, by Tyler Brewington

Inspiration piece

In the language there is life, in the language there is death. I wanted an ambitious renovation of the nest. The nest filled with water and proved just as dangerous as the open sea. I got in in very good time and got, with the dolphin, excellent stabling. I pitched in, I swam for the shark. I mean in support of, in solidarity, and also I swam towards the shark. If there was an outlet here I wasn’t using it. If I had been in Rome, architecturally, I would have said this reminds me of Rome. I looked out to the beyond. It wasn’t a place where people go to have fun, but it happens sometimes. I flew home. Ma’am, I was told at the airport, don’t show me your bikini. Ma’am, I have to find your bikini on my own.

Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Margaret Mair
“What Might Have Been”
Acrylic on canvas
Response

What Lingers
By Amanda Miska
Inspiration piece

When I met you, I was unhappily married and you were dating some tiny, beautiful girl with dark hair who played the cello and wrote stories too—stories I envisioned were much better than mine because she’d had the advantage of beauty, of travel, of small stature.  (This is how my mind goes.)

I could snap her in half like a twig, I thought.  She was so damned delicate.  I hated small women because they made me feel like a blubbery giant and also because men loved them.  Petite women made them feel taller, stronger, more virile.  They could wear heels and not tower over their lovers.  They could be picked up over a shoulder or easily rolled over on a bed.

I knew you could never love me since I was nothing like that.  Besides being taller and rounder and louder, I needed too much. And you were aloof and casual in a way that’s cool to acquaintances but frustrating to those closest to you.  I knew I couldn’t love you, but I did it anyway because attempting the impossible is the only way to keep on living.  Somewhere in between, she left you and I left him, and there was a moment that slipped from our grasp.  Mere seconds. One afternoon could have changed it all, but we weren’t ready. We were too busy.

Oh, how the world moves. We are never in the same place twice, but here you are standing before me as in some parallel universe.  You seem taller, or maybe I am slouching. Maybe my bones have softened over the years.  You look like a man now with only a hint of boyishness to your face rather than the reverse, the way it was the first time I saw you. I pull you close to my breast like a mother, if only to feel your heart beat against mine, your warm skin beneath my hands.  It doesn’t mean anything this way.  It’s just the embrace of old friends.  But we linger a little too long, and then you turn to leave. I reach out to touch your arm and you turn and I tell you:

You never wanted me when I wanted you.  We did this dance, and now there’s a ring on my hand  and you can’t stand it.  But I promise you, if we stood shoulder to shoulder at the kitchen sink (I’d wash/you’d dry), I know you’d get this wistful look for just a second as the sun set, thinking of someone else you can’t have, someone who maybe doesn’t even exist.

I tell you this and you say, “No.  You don’t understand. It’s not like that.”

What’s it like then?

“I need you.”

But I want to be wanted.

Neediness is for children hanging on your legs, but desire is arms pinned down.

I am made of dense things.  When I break, the cracks heal over, stronger than before.  I can say no now.  I can ignore the pull of the Universe, burrow my feet into the dirt so I can stay in one place while you spiral away and out of reach.  You will find love, but I know it will be small.

The next time our paths cross, the lines on my face will surely obscure me to you, and we will pass like strangers and as I walk away without turning, I will think We were so close to it all.

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Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.

Margaret Mair
Leave Me
Acrylic on canvas, 16 x 20 in.
Response

Metro Outlaw
By Charisse Cecil
Inspiration piece

I am an outlaw.
If you ride the Metro rail,
you understand me.

I have to sit there:
in the designated seat
for the disabled.

Those seats face inward.
No one seated behind you,
nor concealed inside.

No rude teenagers,
pelting me with their loud talk
and sunflower seeds.

No child behind me,
yanking at the cowrie shells
that hang from my locs.

No woman brushing
her hair and dander on me,
grooming in public.

No one like the man
sitting down, blocking me in,
brandishing penis.

I need to sit there:
In the designated seat
for the disabled.

If that seat’s not free,
I’ll stand up from Huntington
to Gallery Place.

Note: All of the art, writing, and music on this site belongs to the person who created it. Copying or republishing anything you see here without express and written permission from the author or artist is strictly prohibited.