Large Artist Sketchbook 2020: That I Knew

You may know that in addition to my artwork I also write poetry (posted on my blog Claudia McGill Writes Poetry, Did You Know That?). For the next several months I will be posting here a combined art/poetry project, Large Artist Sketchbook 2020.

I fill up sketchbooks with all kinds of art. Some contain images only and some of them I use the images as inspiration for poetry. In these books the image is on one page of the spread and the poetry on the other. This book is set up in this manner.

I’ll show you the image and then add the poem that goes with it. See what you think.

That I Knew

I followed that faint
track across the field
no one had come this
way in a while and
so between the thorn
bushes tangled up
on the one side and
the scruffy tired weeds
in the yellow dirt
other side they were
eyeing each other
in a hard sort of
way and I felt I
had interrupted
some kind of standoff
just about to let
loose so I stepped high
and fast along the
track heading for the
darkest part seemed like
to me of the woods
and no I was not
exactly keen on
the look of it but
where the track went was
where I had to go.
That
I knew.

I walked on through this
July evening with
flicks of grasshoppers
still flipping and gone
hopping out in front
of me even this
late in dim twilight
and I walked on out
along the track nor
did I hesitate
nor falter. The grass
as soon as my foot
had flattened it down
in the one step then
before the next one
it was gone springing
right back up behind
I did not look back
no looking back would
tell me any more
That
I knew.

2/21/20
Large Artist Sketchbook 2020 image 8
each line 5 syllables

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