painting with ash

The painter painted the sky
with a pallid palette
letting the sentient serve their sentence
of living life in color

A darkness hangs in the air
where a glare from the sun
is what usually makes one squint

and trees like silent sentinels
fill with birds who can’t discern
the gravitas of a gravestone sky

Umbrellas lie mangled in trash bins,
gnarled like worried hands
or boughs bowing somberly
in the breath of wind

he exhaled, tobacco-tinged,
taking a break from unpainting
the world’s brightness

Puddles pool with his cigarette butts
bookending the uncreative process
of reinterpreting our beginnings

And the liquid ashtray overflows
with his nicotine neurotics,
but the rain ensures he’ll have more
to fill with ash concerns
beneath his ashen sky.