how to paint sunlight
on the face of life
Their answers were ambiguous and ingenuous
as if they were all guarding trade secrets
Whereas it seems to me
all you have to do
is conceive of the whole world
and all humanity
as a kind of art work
a site-specific art work
an art project of the god of light
the whole earth and all that's in it
to be painted with light
http://www.babyboybabygirlpictures.com/
And the first thing you have to do
is paint out
postmodern painting
And the next thing is to paint yourself
in your true
colors
in primary colors
as you seem them
(without whitewash)
paint
yourself as you see yourself
without make-up
without masks
Then paint
your favorite people and animals
with your brush loaded with light
And be
sure you get the perspective right
and don't fake it
because one false
line leads to another
all those who lived their
lives
as bearers of light
Paint their eyes
and the eyes of every
animal
and the eyes of beautiful women
known best for the perfection of
their breasts
and the eyes of men and women
known only for the light of
their minds
Paint the light of their eyes
the light of sunlit
laughter
the song of eyes
the song of birds in flight
if it is
anywhere
and you must paint from the inside
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Ferlinghetti at City Lights Bookstore
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Ferlinghetti
Lawrence Ferlinghetti was born in Yonkers, New York, in 1919. After spending his early childhood in France, he received his B.A. from the University of North Carolina, an M.A. from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. from the Sorbonne. During World War II he served in the US Naval Reserve and was sent to Nagasaki shortly after it was bombed. He married in 1951 and has one daughter and one son.
In 1953, Ferlinghetti and Peter Martin began to publish City Lights magazine. They also opened the City Lights Books Shop in San Francisco to help support the magazine. In 1955, they launched City Light Publishing, a book-publishing venture. City Lights became known as the heart of the "Beat" movement, which included writers such as Kenneth Rexroth, Gary Snyder, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac.
Ferlinghetti is the author of more than thirty books of poetry, including Americus, Book I (New Directions, 2004), San Francisco Poems (2002), How to Paint Sunlight (2001), A Far Rockaway of the Heart (1997), These Are My Rivers: New & Selected Poems, 1955-1993 (1993), Over All the Obscene Boundaries: European Poems & Transitions (1984), Who Are We Now? (1976), The Secret Meaning of Things (1969), and A Coney Island of the Mind (1958). He has translated the work of a number of poets including Nicanor Parra, Jacques Prevert, and Pier Paolo Pasolini. Ferlinghetti is also the author more than eight plays and of the novels Love in the Days of Rage (1988) and Her (1966).
In 1994, San Francisco renamed a street in his honor. He was also named the first Poet Laureate of San Francisco in 1998. In 2000, he received the lifetime achievement award from the National Book Critics Circle. Currently, Ferlinghetti writes a weekly column for the San Francisco Chronicle. He also continues to operate the City Lights bookstore, and he travels frequently to participate in literary conferences and poetry readings.
A Selected Bibliography
Poetry
Back Roads to Far Places (1971)
Her (1960)
Open Eye, Open Heart (1973)
Pictures of the Gone World (1955)
Routines (1964)
Starting from San Francisco (1961)
The Mexican Night (1970)
The Secret Meaning of Things (1969)
Tyrannus Nix? (1969)
Unfair Arguments with Existence (1963)
2 comments on Instructions to Painters & Poets ~Lawrence Ferlinghetti
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wonderful poetry. Mahalo for sharing. You posted a Hawaiian comment on another blog but I don't know enough Hawaiian to know what it said.
Thank you for stopping by.
I found it
on a Hawaiian Language link, it was in essance a thank you and blessing. Oh that I'd of been smart enough to bookmark it.