Poem Tryouts: Some Time With Vincent

9:35 a.m. — Atlanta

listening to Cat Stevens singing Wild World

Let’s see, where are we? Ah. Hello. Tell you what, if a small jaunt to my brother’s in Florida throws me off, I hate to think what the rest of the summer is going to be like! Warning: don’t get old. There. My good deed. Hello, everyone. Today is our image prompt.

While wandering through images, I kept being pulled back to one that the I Require Art group on Facebook posted recently. It is a simple painting with an extraordinary pull.

Flower Pot With Garlic Chives
Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh (Dutch, Post-Impressionism, 1853-1890): Flower Pot with Garlic Chives, 1887. Oil on Canvas, 31.5 x 22 cm. Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

I can imagine van Gogh sitting in his studio wondering what to paint next, his eyes passing over various things, idly, as he thinks. The eyes stop, come back to a pot of garlic chives he’s growing. He picks up his brush.

Our creative sparks can come from the damnedest things and we have little control over the stray sparks flying around the central fire. You can take today’s inspiration from the painting in a couple of ways.

1] Take the theme from the title and write about growing something, a specific memory.

Or,

2] Do the same thing I imagine van Gogh to have done and glance around you. Don’t look for something, just let your eyes move around the room. When your brain yells:  Go back! you’ll have what you want to paint into a poem.

3] The usual: anything that your mind says it wants to write when you look at this image.

I shall see you Thursday for the summer calendar; Friday for the prompt roundup; and then again in August. I KNOW. Sounds drastic, doesn’t it. You will still ‘see’ me on Tuesdays, in the form of a prompt. But you probably won’t hear from me.

Happy writing, all.