Statuary:
the first project
The white-haired lady in the picture is Pa’s wife,
the Elder from whom i learned about the Green Kingdom and much, much more …
a Lithuanian Catholic she had a deep Marian devotion
which she lovingingly expressed each May 1st
(weather willing) when Our Lady of Grace,
a greytone cement garden statue
was enthroned on a carpet of myriad silk flowers,
to be replaced when Gram's flowers
burst through the Earth in abundant glory ...
(she could plant a stick and get a rose bush)
in my mid-20s, i wanted to explore beyond New England - and the picture was taken the day
before i left it was the late 70s
while adventure ahead called to me,
my heart was heavy to leave Grandmother …
though she preferred to be called Gram, to me
she is Grandmother in the highest, purest sense,
and i wanted to leave her with something unforgettable
to both of us.
i sat drinking tea as she rinsed dishes at the sink –
every so often she'd d look out the sink window
to Our Lady beyond in her garden.
i suddenly had a thought. “Gram,” i said, “can you still actually see Mary?”
“Don’ call her dat,” she ‘scolded’ me in her wonderful broken English. “She don’ like dat” -
meaning, such familiarity was disrespectful and to be avoided ...
i knew and apologized immediately, then brought the conversation back to her eyesight,
to which Grandmother made an expected, disapproving grunt,
but i pressed; and finally she confessed – to 80 something year old vision,
the unpainted statue's details were more memory than eyesight anymore.
that’s when i knew what to do – i might not be able to draw but i could certainly paint a statue ...
and that's how i painted life into her beloved Blessed Mother
so that she could see her clearly from the kitchen window once again.
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