Ekphrastic on Van Gogh

What pain you must have felt - what a life that you lived

A starving artist - swallows his own paint - in order to feel complete.

Painting the simple folk of a town

The tavern at dusk became your sacred domain.

The room at the asylum made you feel so diminutive.

You were an artist with a silent vow to God.

All of your stress that led to premature aging.

Your paints were your friends

and your paintings were your lovers.

Selling only two in your lifetime - never living to see how famous you’d become

You were humble and modest to a t and few people could see

The genius behind the madness- the madness was deafening

The sensitive and silent strokes of an Impressionist

Calmly reaching for the oranges and the blues

The flames reach higher and the skies

Your paintings - now viewed by millions -

you’re cherished at last

You make your mark on the world - with a night sky painted from memory

Years after you passed away I read

Your letters to your brother - Dear Theo

 what a terrific bond you shared

I know now why you are called a painter.

Thing about artists - we die young and only then are we discovered