Saturday, February 12, 2022




I’ve dedicated an entire sketchbook to nothing but doodles of Oro. That being said, she’s the movin-est dog there ever was and is constantly changing position, hence all the false starts.


Am I Not Among The Early Risers - Mary Oliver


Am I not among the early risers

and the long-distance walkers?


Have I not stood, amazed, as I consider

the perfection of the morning star

above the peaks of the houses, and the crowns of the trees

blue in the first light?

Do I not see how the trees tremble, as though

sheets of water flowed over them

though it is only wind, that common thing,

free to everyone, and everything?


Have I not thought, for years, what it would be

worthy to do, and then gone off, barefoot and with a silver pail,

to gather blueberries,

thus coming, as I think, upon a right answer?


What will ambition do for me that the fox, appearing suddenly

at the top of the field,

her eyes sharp and confident as she stared into mine,

has not already done?


What countries, what visitations,

what pomp

would satisfy me as thoroughly as Blackwater Woods

on a sun-filled morning, or, equally, in the rain?


Here is an amazement–––once I was twenty years old and in

every motion of my body there was a delicious ease,

and in every motion of the green earth there was

a hint of paradise,

and now I am sixty years old, and it is the same.


Above the modest house and the palace–––the same darkness.

Above the evil man and the just, the same stars.

Above the child who will recover and the child who will

not recover, the same energies roll forward,

from one tragedy to the next and from one foolishness to the next.


I bow down.


Have I not loved as though the beloved could vanish at any moment,

or become preoccupied, or whisper a name other than mine

in the stretched curvatures of lust, or over the dinner table?

Have I ever taken good fortune for granted?


Have I not, every spring, befriended the swarm that pours forth?

Have I not summoned the honey-man to come, to hurry,

to bring with him the white and comfortable hive?


And while I waited, have I not leaned close, to see everything?

Have I not been stung as I watched their milling and gleaming,

and stung hard?


Have I not been ready always at the iron door,

not knowing to what country it opens–––to death or to more life?


Have I ever said that the day was too hot or too cold

or the night too long and as black as oil anyway,

or the morning, washed blue and emptied entirely

of the second-rate, less than happiness


as I stepped down from the porch and set out along

the green paths of the world?



Marta Chruchwell wrote this article about my work for the Joplin Globe.


In other news, one of my friends sent me this photo of one of my prints ("...and you will be like God", bottom) hanging in her OBGYN's office. It's always fun to see where my work ends up after being purchased.


 I have a little plein air piece (upper right-hand corner) in the ArtCentral "Verdant" show in Carthage, MO.

Monday, February 7, 2022

February. Oil on Linen Plein Air. 2022

I tried to take advantage of the (melting) snow yesterday for winter plein air painting. It was a pretty nice day out, but I still could have used some toe warmers by the end of the afternoon.

Tuesday, February 1, 2022

Fungi spotted in the wild

$10 per hr

Kansas City, MO

Winter polypores