Drawing Frank
The sun, shifting from east to west paints exquisite light and shadow on Frank's face. His left eye, half shuttered by eyelid, appears contemplative, inward. The right eye is shrouded by upward wafting smoke from a cigarette. Unreadable.
I draw him in pencil using the sharp tip of a 2B, the side edge of a 6B and all in between for clean line and shades of shade. So many nuances that sun and self show. Impossible to capture a soul in totality. I settle for a moment in time.
My ancestors in old sepia photographs line up like dominoes row upon row, wearing frozen smiles or frowns. They pose for the camera in Sunday's best apparel. They are uncomfortable, fidgeting, while the photographer tediously prepares for his one image.
The fields are ready to be plowed or reaped. I cannot tell by the light what season this might be. There is only lack of snow and the turn of a lip to tell me of the impatience to rid oneself of funeral and wedding garb.
Frank has no fields to plow, no crops demanding harvesting before the frost: no pigs to slaughter to smoke their hides into bacon for the coming winter's hunger. He moves inward in his favourite chair, third eye a mystery. He has his own troubles. I have mine. We meet somewhere between sepia and reality.
@grapher April 2, 2015
