the silhouette in the window of the ruined wall
that overlooks an obscured sea
the elongated cypress trees rise from the verdant hill;
vibrant compositions accented in gold and sienna
cross the line between imagination
and recollection.
you visit the patrimony with your parents, your children, your wife;
each of you seeing its olive entangled hills, its aquamarine seas for the first time;
you meet a cousin whose vision could be your own
georgic images caught on her foreign canvas.
long before you left,
we viewed the paintings that occupy the walls of your house
here in the new land; we peruse colour photographs upon your return
and discover that all this time, you have been painting from memory
