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The Artist’s
Almanac
June 2008
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And what is so rare as a day in June?
Then, if ever, come perfect days;
Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune,
And over it softly her warm ear lays.
- James Russell Lowell
We can all agree on this: it is the
most perfect spring anyone can remember. With an uninterrupted
succession of gorgeous bloom and no late frosts, summer may yet
fulfill spring’s exuberant promise.
The peonies droop their drowsy
fragrance and the roses rival the gardens of England while the
mockingbird, from his jaunty perch on the peak of the roof, trills
his endless variety of song. Suddenly it changes to his chipping
war cry and growl as he sights the cat stalking across the lawn in
search of a young nestling. He practices a swoop, claws extended,
as the cat dares him, just once, to come too close. I would hate
to choose between my cat and my beloved mockingbird, which sings
to me all hours and will sacrifice his life in defense of his
young.
Even when most beautiful, nature is
stalked by death and darkness. Every artist knows this, and finds
light in his paintings only by contrasting it to the darkest dark.
And there is nothing blacker than a black crow, the avian type of
original sin.
This morning I was awakened by a
commotion of crows. So was my wife, and by the time I dressed to
investigate, she was at the front door, clapping, to scare them
away. What sounded like a hundred was no more than a half-dozen,
which flew away flinging curses over their shoulders at her.
Nothing curses like a crow. They
themselves are a curse to American farmers, whose freshly planted
corn and tenders shoots are their favorite foods. The pioneers,
depending on corn for their survival, placed bounties on their
scalps. They are enemies of all created things and who of us has
not seen some small bird chasing vainly after a crow with an egg
in his beak? Even artists and poets, like Poe in The Raven
and Shakespeare in Othello, shunned them as ominous.
Beethoven used bird song in his Pastoral Symphony and
Vaughn Williams celebrated The Lark Ascending, but no
composer ever dedicated music to a raven or a crow.
I have never even photographed, much
less painted, a crow, but I have hunted them since a boy. Audubon,
who, for the sake of completeness, had to include a crow and a
raven in his catalogue of American birds, pictured the crow with a
sickly shine and the raven with unkempt feathers, thrusting his
body forward to amplify his ugly croak, like some dirty old man. I
had rather eat crow than paint one.
Crows are very intelligent birds.
Hunters will tell you that they can count them entering and
leaving blinds, know whether they are carrying guns, post
lookouts, celebrate mourning rituals, and that they have an
elaborate language of calls. The expert hunter knows their calls
of warning, mourning, cursing, harassing and ‘come quickly’. The
best of these I’ve ever heard was perfected by a boyhood friend
who used only his voice, pitched from the back of his throat
through cupped hands. In moments he could put them thick over our
heads one time only for only one shot.
Later this morning they were back
again in the thick cedars across the street where they had a hawk
or sleepy owl cornered. Like Senators grilling an energy executive
they cursed and cawed as I practiced my rusty skills and crept
with loaded shotgun toward them. The black creatures were in the
blackest of trees, a thick cedar, and I had to cross the street to
get a better vantage.
That did it. Using their diving
escape flight they slid silently through the tight limbs, followed
by a large bird I took to be an owl or hawk. They trailed him a
mile away where they continued their cursing, which now included
me.
When I returned to the quiet patio
the mockingbird reiterated his love for his mate in the grove
across the way, as the rooster up the hill triumphantly announced
yet another day. The privet extended its blooming reach across
another two feet of the pasture and from the river below the thrum
of the barge tow headed upriver with a load of coal assured me all
would be well and we would have electricity, lights, and air
conditioning to get us through another hot summer. For now, the
crows are gone and I enjoy the sounds, light, feel, taste and
fragrances of early summer.
Events
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Art In The Garden - A Garden Party to
Benefit Cragfont – Castalian Springs, Tennessee, 5-8 PM,
June 14th 2008, see below
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Fall Into Art – Hendersonville High
School, October 3-5
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