THERE we stood, my dad and me:
Him staring at a painting.
I was looking back and forth
Between him and it.
He asked me,
"How many colors do you see?"
"Green, orange, yellow... maybe blue?"
"No, all of them. All the colors are there.
Look, pink, purple, gray, brown, teal..."
But I couldn't see them.
For art doesn't begin with what you can draw,
It starts with what you can see.
And I was given only partial sight.
I couldn't see it, though I tried
With everything I had.
It takes some doing to be a disappointment
To your parents at age ten,
But I managed.
For I was not an artist, as he was,
I was given no key that opened those locks,
Neither at ten, nor now,
At sixty.
He could see what I could not;
And he could see
That
I could not
Though, he too, clearly
Wished I could
