She Painted Souls

My heart thumped loudly.
It was all I could hear.
His voice distant now.
I once danced just for him,
He loved it so.
Dirty, though elegant.
It's all so distant now.

She fumbled her words when she spoke of her dreams,
He didn't pick out the points she was tirelessly trying to make.
This frustrated her, an inability to describe the thought.
She gazed sometimes at other men,
He thought she was straying,
She was curious how some men carried themselves.
It didn't always mirror the way they were dressed.
He began to respond as if betrayed.
She didn't explain well.
He did not understand.
She painted soul's she saw on the street,
Men mostly.
He began to rage and said, you'll know no other man than me.
BUT....she still couldn't explain so he would understand.
So she painted.
They were faces that moved her brush in paint.
She could speak with each stroke. Line. Color.
Jumbles of light shards & emotion moved her soul.
Awaken her mind.
Pushed her to create.
But she could only paint what she felt.
It was her way to tell her story.
He did not understand.
He only saw him.

She wept as she painted him some years later.
He didn't look the same as in snapshots.
She remembered him differently.
Strange.
His face had hard lines & little kindness.
It was not a gentle image she pushed onto her canvas.
I love you so, she cried.
You made me want to dance...even when I was alone.
I don't dance anymore.
But I paint you now in my sorrow.
You've changed.
I loved this? She wondered.

His image hung in a gallery window.
He passed by.
He was grief sicken at his image. A reflection of his soul.
He could see her dancing, dirty and elegant.
He gave up on her to soon...

Original art by Cherie Strong