Fireflies

16 x 16 Oil on Panel

It was late. It was very late. I went outside to study the night. Each step I took away from the the house took me deeper and deeper into the Stygian darkness. Except for the fact that I could feel my feet on the earth I could have been floating in space. Soon my eyes began to adjust and shapes and patterns and colors started to appear. The shapes were massive, the patterns unrecognizable, the colors variations of black. I heard music. Music that I'd never heard before. A piano sonata for the left hand alone. It was deep and lovely. I don't think it ever rose above the lowest octave on the instrument. No composer had ever stayed that low for that long. Or any painter. Even Whistler didn't go that far in his nocturnes. Rothko and a few others did black paintings but they were spiritual journeys, color experiments, abstractions. I was experiencing the landscape. The shapes became familiar. A mass of trees. No details, just a hint of form, a suggestion of color. The pattern was the tree tops against a moonless sky. The color a subtle shift from dark greens and grays and blacks to gentle, but still dark, blues and violets. Then a flash. Then another. Fireflies. Beacons of life. The right hand hovered above the piano occasionally dropping down to find a fluttering eighth note. Then another. Each with its own color. One yellow, one orange, one iridescent green. It was beautiful. I watched and listened. Then I walked back inside and began to plan my painting for the next day.....