Old Bridge Over Sugarland Run

Something about the other side of the looking glass
charms us, world seen through a knothole
or wavery and topsy-turvy in a stream
or leaping at us in a riot of fronds
and snaky branches from within
a simple frame.

The just-out-of-reach, familiar, but untouchable,
touches us. It is as if we are not
really here, see only a hazy inkling
of a home we've never left, only ceased
to continue to create, become other than,
become the absence of...

If I look for a few moments at this painting,
I begin to feel at home. Home is where it's safe
to create distances, where we peer out
through a dark tunnel or the two quaint
eye-holes of a face-mask for tricks
and treats:

To have another side to be separate from
so that we can touch and be touched.

Dean Blehert

Last Updated: October 6, 2002