My father could paint a window frame without masking tape and not leave a spot of paint on the glass. He had steady hands, and incredible patience.
My painting is more reckless, and I use lots of masking tape, but I am generally satisfied with the results. I painted a small room over the Christmas holidays to house my treadmill and it looks pretty good. I’m having bamboo flooring installed now that the painting is done, and I will be ready to start my new exercise program.
The woman in the following poem is painting a space that she has lived in for 10 years and is leaving. She is already feeling the loss of the life she leaves behind. In a way she is painting over that life in preparation for starting over somewhere else. I was thinking of this poem as I painted my new exercise room, and thinking of my father, who recently moved to a VA home. At 96 he is starting over.
I found the poem on the Poetry 180 website, one of my favorite places to find new poetry.
Painting a Room
Katia Kapovich
Here on a March day in ‘89
I blanch the ceiling and walls with bluish lime.
Drop cloths and old newspapers hide
the hardwood floors. All my furniture has been sold,
or given away to bohemian friends.
There is nothing to eat but bread and wine.
An immigration visa in my pocket, I paint
the small apartment where I’ve lived for ten years.
Taking a break around 4 p.m.,
I sit on the last chair in the empty kitchen,
smoke a cigarette and wipe my tears
with the sleeve of my old pullover.
I am free from regrets but not from pain.
Ten years of fears, unrequited loves, odd jobs,
of night phone calls. Now they’ve disconnected the line.
I drop the ashes in the sink, pour turpentine
into a jar, stirring with a spatula. My heart throbs
in my right palm when I pick up the brush again.
For ten years the window’s turquoise square
has held my eyes in its simple frame.
Now, face to face with the darkening sky,
what more can I say to the glass but thanks
for being transparent, seamless, wide
and stretching perspective across the size
of the visible.
Then I wash the brushes and turn off the light.
This is my last night before moving abroad.
I lie down on the floor, a rolled-up coat
under my head. This is the last night.
Freedom smells of a freshly painted room,
of wooden floors swept with a willow broom,
and of stale raisin bread.
