Here are the watercolor paintings, month by month, featured in the 2023 calendar.
Beach Dreaming All Year
Category: Painting
Beach Dreaming
Here is my calendar for 2023: a collection of watercolors I have painted at the beach over the years.
Hymn to the Morning
For September 1, the opening lines of a poem by Phillis Wheatley (emancipated from slavery in 1774).
Attend my lays, ye ever honour’d nine,
Assist my labours, and my strains refine;
In smoothest numbers pour the notes along,
For bright Aurora now demands my song.
Aurora hail, and all the thousand dies,
Which deck thy progress through the vaulted skies:
The morn awakes, and wide extends her rays…
For the rest of this poem, please see An Hymn to Phillis.
Memory of Venice/Valentines Day
For this day, a painting, and a poem by Philip Booth.
Nightsong
Beside you,
lying down at dark,
my waking fits your sleep.
Your turning
flares the slow-banked fire
between our mingled feet,
and there,
curved close and warm
against the nape of love,
held there,
who holds your dreaming
shape, I match my breathing
to your breath;
and sightless, keep my hand
on your heart’s breast, keep
nightwatch
on your sleep to prove
there is no dark, nor death.
—Philip Booth
Chanson d’automne
For the first day of fall, a poem by Paul Verlaine. Translation by Arthur Symons.
Les sanglots longs
Des violons
De l’automne
Blessent mon coeur
D’une langueur
Monotone.
Tout suffocant
Et blême, quand
Sonne l’heure,
Je me souviens
Des jours anciens
Et je pleure
Et je m’en vais
Au vent mauvais
Qui m’emporte
Deçà, delà,
Pareil à la
Feuille morte.
—Paul Verlaine (1844-1896)
When a sighing begins
In the violins
Of the autumn-song,
My heart is drowned
In the slow sound
Languorous and long
Pale as with pain,
Breath fails me when
The hours tolls deep.
My thoughts recover
The days that are over
And I weep.
And I go
Where the winds know,
Broken and brief,
To and fro,
As the winds blow
A dead leaf.
Cards!
Because there won’t be any in-person holiday bazaar for my cards this year, my website is updated (thank you Devin!) to do everything online. Please check it out, along with some new cards. I hope you like it. (Below, some discount codes.)
If you decide to order as many as 5 or 10, you may use the code 5FOR20 or 10FOR40 for a discount. If you are nearby and prefer a safely socially-distant pickup, use code PICKUP for no shipping, and contact me to make arrangements.
When Autumn Came
A painting and a poem for the autumn equinox.
This is the way that autumn came to the trees:
it stripped them down to the skin,
left their ebony bodies naked.
It shook out their hearts, the yellow leaves,
scattered them over the ground.
Anyone could trample them out of shape
undisturbed by a single moan of protest.
The birds that herald dreams
were exiled from their song,
each voice torn out of its throat.
They dropped into the dust
even before the hunter strung his bow.
Oh, God of May have mercy.
Bless these withered bodies
with the passion of your resurrection;
make their dead veins flow with blood again.
Give some tree the gift of green again.
Let one bird sing.
—Faiz Ahmed Faiz 1911-1984
Four Green Fields
For St. Patrick’s Day, a painting, and the folk song by Irish musician Tommy Makem that inspired the painting.
What did I have, said the fine old woman
What did I have, this proud old woman did say
I had four green fields, each one was a jewel
But strangers came and tried to take them from me
I had fine strong sons, who fought to save my jewels
They fought and they died, and that was my grief, said she
Long time ago, said the fine old woman
Long time ago, this proud old woman did say
There was war and death, plundering and pillage
My children starved, by mountain, valley, and sea
And their wailing cries, they shook the very heavens
My four green fields ran red with their blood, said she
What have I now, said the fine old woman
What have I now, this proud old woman did say
I have four green fields, one of them’s in bondage
In strangers’ hands, that tried to take it from me
But my sons had sons, as brave as were their fathers
My fourth green field will bloom once again, said she
Monthly Paintings: Cathedral Calendar 2020
These are the paintings featured, one for each month, in my Washington National Cathedral calendar for 2020. (Click twice to enlarge.)
Melissa
Donna
A Calendar for 2020: Cathedral
Here is my new calendar for 2020, each month featuring one of a series of paintings at Washington National Cathedral and its gardens. The calendar is 8-1/2″ x 11″ and printed on sturdy satin stock, substantial enough that the images can be saved as prints. (Soon I will post the paintings for each month, so that you can see them all, unless you prefer to be surprised.)
A single calendar is $23; a set of two is $42; plus shipping. Shipping is Priority Mail, domestic US. If you are in my area, you can obtain a calendar from me directly without shipping cost—just let me know.
I’m sorry that international shipping costs make the calendars too expensive to ship overseas.
They will also be available at the Washington Waldorf School Holiday Bazaar on November 23rd, along with note cards featuring the Cathedral paintings and my other cards as well.
Single calendar:
Set of 2 calendars: