excerpt

Whatever the sex of the baby, she felt comforted by its cravings. Gert squeezed the  colors onto the ceramic plate on pure instinct, each nudge telling her which bottle of pain to choose.  The walls of her bedroom were an overbooked gallery.  Canvases hanging, leaning, hiding behind the doors.   Sketches and evolving ideas carpeting the floor.  It drove Irma crazy.  Normal women craved ice cream or potatoes chips not painting.  This house was not a refuge for feminine normalcy. The unborn child determined the first brushstroke, the layers, combination of colors.  At times Gert could close her eyes and allow the brush to move of its own accord.  Sometimes her paint stained fingers would take over, adding or removing color, shaping the images with fingertip and palm.  The earlier landscape images predicted the yellow mist that came at nightfall.  There were burst of multicolored light from the sky. Figures moving across the arid desert.  A woman, filled with light, wrist and ankles darkened and scarred.  Buildings engulfed in flames.  Bloodshed.   The images frightened Gert, but she ignored her fear.  Convincing herself that the unborn child had an active imagination. When the painting was over she would sit on the edge of the bed, too exhausted to get up and wash her hands.  Sometimes too exhausted to fall asleep.  Occasionally she would sit there until morning.  Until she finally had the strength to remove the easel from in front of the bed, wash her hands and attempt to start her day.