Sign Inventory, Week Eleven

"Joseph Sees Me Painting My Thumbs Blue," by: Aimee Nezhukumatathil
                              (for my brother who almost happened)

Joesph sees me
painting my thumbs blue
like little cobalt sausages
jutting out from each palm.
My hands drip flowers
on each canvas, and it is his breath
that turns every petal,
curving outward just slightly at each end.

Sometimes my hand moves
my brush into a shape so perfect,
I know it cannot be of this earth.
And so, I think of my ancestors watching
over me, Joesph in front, leaning to guide
each stroke with his sure arm.

My brother, I never knew you,
and yet unfairly, you know everything
about me. Standing there in our father's
old shirt, I paint to talk to you.
I paint to talk with you
through my fingers, as if you lay
somewhere between the thin slips
of paint and my hand.

Sign Inventory:

1) In the first stanza, there is an interesting moment when the narrator speaks about the way in which he brother breathes and the petals turn outwardly on the page. On the one hand, this might suggest that her brother's breath represents some kind of life, having the ability to make things grow/blossom. On the other hand, the brother's breath might insinuate that he (although not a physical being) filters a type of passion, an infusion of inspiration for the speaker... that she cannot quite obtain from anywhere or anyone else.
2) Stanza two, then, seems to further support (if the claim above is used) the material in stanza one. The second stanza reveals the speakers need for and partial reliance on the spirit of her dead brother to help create these beautiful images... to produce art. What's appears so strange about this part in the text is that the narrator actually envisions the brother 'leaning to guide each stroke with his sure arm', in a sense implying that the speaker truly believes in his (omni)presence- almost as if he can be there with her while watching over/directing over elsewhere.
3) The point in the text that probably most catches my attention is the final stanza. In the third stanza, the speaker mentions, again, her brother being near while painting... and it appears that during this (special) time, the two interconnect- as if the only way for this interaction and out-of-body experience occurs while the speaker paints.
4) If this be the case, then, I cannot help but to think about what it means to project images, to project art... to project a sort of surreal and uncanny, liminal experience between the real and the unreal. Also, I think about  this notion of projection and evoking ones muse through abstract art.. and then slabbing it onto a canvas... but why? So that it might actually become real, in a sense? Or so there exist, at least, some type of evidence and explanation for things unseen, for why things aren't the way they should have been? Maybe?