Matt Beard

The President

Two things happened recently.

First, I spent a week exploring and painting along one of mainland California’s most remote and mysterious coastlines. Missile launch silos. American flags. Chain of command and all that. But this painting isn’t about that trip at all except for one detail. One morning on the beach, miles from the nearest pavement of any sort, I came across some paw prints on the beach. I’d heard of mountain lions on this coast, and somehow I always pictured those cats, well, up in the mountains. The thought of one of these majestic beasts with sand stuck between its toes got my imagination working.

Second, I was asked to come paint live at a fundraiser for a friend who’s running for elected office here in Humboldt. He’s commissioned artwork from me in the past and I ate an unwholesome amount of snacks at his Superbowl party one year without even watching the game. I have no way to know whether he’s the perfect fit for the job he’s seeking, but I do know that over the years he’s been a supporter of artists like myself, so while that means I am certainly biased, it also means he’s been a meaningful part of this community’s culture long before seeking public office.

I’m not a fan of political gamery at any level and try to steer clear at all costs. But then again, I’ve never had a collector or personal friend ask me to come and paint at their political fund-raiser before, so I didn’t give it much thought and next thing you know I have to figure out what to paint at a fancy politics party.

How do I get myself into these situations?

And then I remembered the mountain lion that prowled through my thoughts on that beach a few weeks earlier. It just felt right. Those cats are apex critters if there ever were, and truthfully politics is a game of apex aspirations. But what good is apex power without honest self-reflection? It’s no good at all, that’s what. Disastrous even. So our mountain lion stands over a tidepool, its silhouette reflecting in the clear waters below, revealing a vibrant ecosystem beneath the surface.

I know that sounds a little corny, but that’s what I thought about while painting this one.

And my hope for my friend and everyone else that seeks public office, is just what this painting portrays. That it’s not about just how to win and score points and use the power you seek to shape the world as you want it, but to also honestly reflect on your role in your community, our community. I can only hope that those who seek power will also take the time to look within and find the clarity to see all of us staring back in your reflection.

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Recent Fractures

Standing on the edge
Where everything brittle must eventually break
Where every painting is a tempting of fate

I do think about these things
But not deeply, and not with too much weight
Because I try to tread lightly on the edge of fate

But recent fractures
Can’t be ignored nor can I the consequences understate
Should I be a fool with the my easel and miscalculate
And become a statistic for the local papers to state
All for the homage to beauty that I’d hoped to create
If the ground would only have held for one more day
So with caution I step, and I work, and I pray
Because more than anything I would surely hate
To subjugate
My wife and my kids
To suffer from my foolishly befallen fate

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Who Are You?

Let’s meet for tacos. I drag an art pal along and we meet up with a lawyer friend who has collected both of our works. The tacos are delicious but they are giant burgers and these beers are absolutely perfect. Another lawyer pal of the first lawyer shows up and another round ensues. We leave the funny tacos and head out to paint this spot for the collector friend. We drive a convoluted route through a college campus to a packed parking lot and wander off past the college kids all over the sandstone bluffs in search of this view. Once we find it, we scratch an X and we return to the lot and offload my paint pack with our latecomer lawyer pal and drive all the way back around to the non-college lot and walk back across the sandstone bluffs back to our X marks the spot and wonder where our latecomer lawyer with the pack is at. Phone calls are made. I’m confused, but that is typical. I just work here, nobody tells me anything. And I never question lawyers. Especially lawyers with bags full of ice cold beers. Finally the gear arrives with our friend in tow and I set to work on this painting over the banter of surf tales going back generations and harmonica tunes going back even further. These guys have seen some things here. Not all of it friendly. But some of it magically beautiful too. The sun sets and we wander back to the cars and set off in search of burgers and beers. I ride with the lawyers and we head over to a bar and grill near the pier, where parking does not exist at this hour except for lawyers who’ve seen some things and know that they can park in the customer only surf shop lot after hours right behind the restaurant row and walk straight into the bar like they own the place and since I don’t question lawyers in bars I follow right behind as we walk through dishwasher steam clouds and down a narrow hallway dodging piles of dirty dishes with long legs when a sweaty faced kid appears from a doorway and stops in his tracks before being steamrolled by the three musketeers marching through his kitchen uninvited and says as we pass by,

“Who ARE you guys?”

And I don’t even know, and I’m not gonna start asking questions now. And the burgers were delicious but they were pizzas and the beers were once again absolutely perfect.

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Higher Learning

If I had learned a little more
I’d have known what not to do
I’d have stood my ground
And refused to paint
The whole entire view

But here we are after the fact
Showing every reef and where they lie
Splayed out across this canvas
From a vantage point
Halfway up the sky

A smarter arter would have simply
Painted only one piece of this coast
But thankfully
I missed that class
And I’m not as smart as most

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Not Exactly No

It was bright green
And there wasn’t very much of it
Still dripping with saltwater
Across her goosebumped flesh

I knew she was an artist
Because as I fought to keep my focus
Safely on the twin circles
Of her eyes
I could see they were dark
And curious

She saw me setting up on this cliff
As she dipped under a wave
Too cool off down below
So she came up the path
And straight for me

It was a short conversation
There wasn’t very much of it
She wanted to see the painting
I had barely even started
The painting was at an awkward point
That made two of us
And I couldn’t say no
Not exactly
I just muttered something
Of a fumbled disclaimer

But she was unfazed
And just as she stepped closer
To see the barely sketched out canvas
My artist pals drove by

I don’t know what it looked like
But later they informed me
I’d be buying beer that night
Or they’d send the photo to my wife

—

* I thought this was pretty funny, but I don’t think I mentioned this to my wife yet, so if you’re reading this honey: I love you like crazy and I sure hope you know it.

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When the Ship Comes In

The ship has sailed
And with it your lover
Stolen away
So you live like a pirate now
Steering your terrestrial warship
Your vessel made of sand
Stealing only what you need
And in need of everything
And needing it today
Stealing whatever you can
Stealing one last glance
At the bigger picture
Before your world grows small
As you wait for the rising tide
To level it all
In a baptism of salt

And if a mighty king
Should later arrive
With plastic bucket and shovel
Barefoot and sunburned
With a grape stuck up his nose
And a panicked mother
Searching far and wide
For her lost prince
Who happily builds his castle
From the scattered shards
Of your broken body
Then
Just maybe then
You can live again
As the castle’s ghost
Belonging to the King

 

—

 

I was thinking of baptism when I wrote that poem. Mostly because of the person who suggested I paint this place, possibly for his dad. I’d never met him, or his dad. I didn’t know at the time that his dad had baptized hundreds or thousands of hippies here at this beach at the end of the 60’s when all those kids realized their sex and drugs and all-of-that wasn’t exactly creating a better culture after all, and so many of them turned to Jesus all at once.

But I did know of his dad. I knew him as a pretty well known southern California pastor, and also as the man who commissioned the Gospel of John series of perhaps the greatest paintings ever made by Rick Griffin, one of my favorite artists of all time. He even told me that he and his dad saw shades of Griffin’s work in my own. It meant the world to me to hear that from them. No doubt Griffin was an inspiration. And that’s an understatement.

Ah well then, I went to paint the scene anyway. Hot day, crawling with people. I found my perch and noticed lots of equipment on the beach (too much fuss for the painting so I left it out). A kid with green hair scampered down the dirt path on my right and asked what was going on down there. I told him I had no idea, I just work here, nobody tells me anything. When he returned 20 minutes later I asked him if he found out what was going on. He says they’re filming something called the Jesus Revolution. I look it up later and it turns out it’s a film about the guys’ dad, and all of his hippie baptizing from 50 years ago.

I have no idea what that must have been like, but sounds like it’ll be an interesting film.

What I do know for certain though, is that on this 85 degree day standing in the hot sun over this beach, I could have used a good refreshing baptism at least 3 or 4 times while painting here.

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Where It Wishes

You never know where the wind will take you.
I generally avoid painting down at sea level.
I like to be up on the edge of the cliff.
Canvas bouncing in the wind.
But today I’m here.
Not of my own decision.
I’m painting this for some friends.
They’re moving on, and this, a parting gift.
You never know where the wind will take you.

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The Brighter Side of Widowhood

As I was nearly finished with painting this scene
I watched a woman descend the narrow path
To this small cove
With her child
They were beautiful
And complete
As they were

She didn’t need a husband down there
Checking his phone
Drinking too many beers
Zoning out when his daughter called for him
Showing off in the frigid water
And looking more like a fat walrus on his return
Than the finely sculpted merman
He thinks he is

They made me think of you
And of us
And if I should die before you
Look at the bright side…
No more beard hairs on the table
On the floor
On the kitchen counters
In our books
In our bed
In our mouths
No more listening to me talk on and on when I should just shut up
No more wondering why I’ve shut up when I should be talking
No more fool of a man to look down on
For being a fool of a man
For overthinking everything
For procrastinating too much
For working all the time
For not having the time or or means to take the family on enough amazing vacations
For preferring colder weather
For preferring to pray silently
For not doing enough
For wanting too much from you
For not being the man you hoped for
For checking my phone too much
For drinking too many beers
For zoning out on our kids
For being a beer-bellied walrus
For not saying sorry enough

And for dying
I’m sorry about that too

So look on the bright side…
You’ll be joining me sooner or later
When the time is right
And there will be no more disappointment then
Only the truest love to share
Between us

(But I cant promise anything
About the beard hairs
We’ll just have to see how that goes)

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Thermal Windows

This private beach club cove once hosted a thriving whaling community. If one could activate time layers to run simultaneously we’d see grandmas playing smashball over bloody whale carcasses being carved away on the beach. But today is a quiet weekday and I see neither. I only see the quiet scene blurred through my sweating eyeballs as the southern California heat rises from the scorched desert at my feet. And speaking of whales and sweat, of coarse everyone knows that whales don’t sweat (I didn’t, I had to look it up just to be sure, but I strongly suspected they wouldn’t). But if that’s so, how then do they cool off?  Sometime or another all that oily blubber must work a little too well and trap them in too much heat, not unlike my current predicament while painting on this hill. Apparently they have regions on their body around the dorsal fins and elsewhere where the blubber layer is minimal, and these zones are packed with fine blood vessels. Whale gets hot, pumps more blood to these “thermal windows”, blood cools off, whale cools off, pumps less blood to thermal windows, whale warms up, etc. My thermal windows weren’t working so well today. Had to resort to some ice cold external 12oz thermal regulator cans full of deliciously fizzy fermented grains. They helped. Science is amazing.

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Needle in a Haystack

The needle was the view
And the haystack was the mist
I come for the first
But cursed my luck
When I couldn’t see past my fist

I set up in faith
That it would clear
And momentarily it did
Had to work quick
To get the jist
And that is what you see here

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Lost… Or Just Displaced

The glossy pages of outdoor magazines are the admission tickets. Nylon and Gore-Tex nomads. Lovers of the adventurous life with paid time off. Communing with nature while eating astronaut food under the stars. Always keep it moving. You have to match the speed of gravity to stay in orbit. Don’t stop, or you might get lost… or just displaced.

Back to the land hippies spring up like flowers in shelters built from the ruins of industry scattered across the landscape. Avoid the rat race. Avoid the poisoned food. Avoid shaving. Avoid scary Jack who lost his mind way up the creek one day and has been hunting for it ever since. Avoid going to town if possible. And never go south to the Big City or you will probably get lost… or just displaced.

Pioneering profiteers rumbling the earth with the crash of money trees. Damn the creeks, and damn it all. Mill the timber and milk the earth for all it’s worth. God knows it will waste no time consuming you when your time on her surface is done. So do what you can now for the ones you love. And keep an eye on your little ones. Don’t let them venture too far from their homes. They could easily get lost… or just displaced.

Smoke and fire. Souls released to the heavens as blood returns to earth. Apologies for mentioning a massacre, but nothing can erase the memory of a small child who hid from the light-skinned newcomers and watched her older sisters heart cruelly cut from her chest and her body and heart both left for dead so that when the child finally emerged after the murderers were gone she knew not what else to do so she stood in the blackened grass and held her sisters heart in her hands. And cried. Lost. And now displaced.

Homes of rough hewn redwood full of drying fish and baskets full of baby sisters laughter. A bird that visited each morning, turning it’s head just so. They thought it silly. It thought them beautiful. The grownups had worries that traced back for a thousand years at least. The little ones barely remembered breakfast and wanted life to stay like this forever. So they decided to never grow up because if they did, all would be lost… or just displaced.

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A Little Ways Away

Thérèse of Lisieux
Born in an age of books without end
Teachers teaching the taught
The perfected lesson
The corrected doctrine
But no one to love the world entire

Unable to bear the burden
And fully aware of the limits
Of her own imperfect love
Small, weak, and broken
She found her greatest strength
In her failure

No longer striving for greatness
Of knowledge or deed
She forged The Little Way
By scattering flowers
Of small sacrifice
Of fleeting glance
Of gentle word
The smallest
Actions of
Love

And

Light
Falling on
The monastery
That bears her name
Across the bay
A Little Ways away
A simple reminder
That this canvas
On which I lay down petals
Of Red Yellow Blue and White
Is but itself
Insignificant
And merely another
Flower scattered
For Love

 

 

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Stairway to Here

It’s the word that was spoken
Before I was sent
To a world collapsing
Under it’s own colorless night

We look with our eyes
And see failure
An abandoned outhouse
A crime spree
Suspicion and
Self destruction
Egos ablaze
And rampant consumption
Of her beautiful form
Of her body
Of earth
And water

But these aren’t the words

And this isn’t the book

There’s no stairway to heaven
Only a stairway
To here

So go forth
But not with your eyes
Just give them your heart
And every color within it
And I’ll give you my word
And my word is

Love

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Pacific Coast Higher Way

I know where this is going
I just don’t know the way
The road turned inland
Behind steeper hills
What lies beyond them?
Who can come close
Or ever even try to say?
Only those who travel
The Pacific Coast Higher Way

The twists and turns
Down here below
Far from the straight and narrow
They betray our longing
To let loose
And fly
Like the arrow

Confined to our vessels
Where the rubber meets the road
Constrained by highway asphalt
Here on earth below
And even if we should break free
From these well-oiled rolling chains
Our feet would fail us still
O’er the impassible terrains

We cannot fathom the beauty
That stays hidden from our view
By these high and holy mounts
We consult our maps
We pour over our charts
But still we’ll have our doubts

In the domain of birds
Dwell our thoughts of wonder
And all that is beyond
It remains far off
Just out of reach
Like the cat
To the fish
In the pond
And when the surface breaks
And the claws sink in
And all higher thoughts are gone
Who knows if we’ll ever
Understand the air
Or even the words to this song

To see these shores with my own eyes
As good as touching hand to earth
I’ll need another body
I’ll need another birth
I’ll need to start again
I’ll need a spirit that is new
Or perhaps an aeroplane
That would also do

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Again

1981  
She sat in her chair   
Laughing  
(with concern)  
When I put 27 grapes in my mouth at once  
And got one stuck up my nose  
Again  
  
1982  
She sat in her chair   
Sleeping  
(blissfully unaware)  
While I dug a hole  
All the way to China  
Again  
  
1983  
She sat in her chair  
Pondering  
(with me)  
When I sat beside her and asked  
Why the sand was full of plastic  
Again  
  
1984  
She sat in her chair   
Reading  
(romance novels)  
When I was hit in the head  
By a stray surfboard  
Again  
  
1985  
She jumped out of her chair  
Yelling  
(things I can’t repeat)  
At the seagull thiefs   
Who came for our lunches  
Again  
  
1986  
She sat on her boogie board  
Grinning  
(behind dark sunglasses)  
Like the coolest kid on the beach  
After riding the wave of her life  
Again  
  
2021  
She sat in her chair alone
Leaving  
(this world behind)  
And I wish we could be  
Back on this beach
Again  

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Parts and Pieces

I forged you in an open field
On a bright and cloudless day
Rare elements and minerals
Mixed within the clay
You took the form my eyes beheld
And there was no other way
I gave to you part of myself
And let the chips fall where they may
I gave you more and more and more
I gave and then I gave

And now parts of me are missing
I’m losing pieces everyday
I’m not the same as I ever was
And I don’t know what to say

You stuck your boot into the mud
Your hand into the brine
You painted me as though I mattered
As though parts of you were mine
And now I’ll go into the world
Forgotten by design
Set aside where few will see
Although to them I just may shine
But it’s not me that draws them in
It’s the parts of you they find

And now parts of you are with me
I’m finding more everyday
I’m not the same as I ever was
And I don’t know what to say

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My Father’s Song

There’s a song my father used to sing
Not really a song at all
Just a rhythm of syllables
Rising and falling
With every step
And a pause with
Every breath

There were never any words
Neither for the song itself
Nor for the way
It brings me home

It would often be sung
Out in the wilderness
Surrounded by wonders
Sometimes emerging
From an ice cold pool
Formed by a beaver dam
In the high mountains

Or sometimes just in the kitchen
After a phone call
Grandpa has gone home
And our hearts fell
Like fresh-washed plates
And broke

Today I heard the song again
It came from my own heart
Sung quietly over my kids
On a forest path
As they took my hand
And said
Papa we’ll show you
The waterfall
And the ice cold pool

And along that path
The song walked along
Never really beginning
And never really ending
Just filling the air
Like the call of birds
Like the rush of the creek
Like my Father’s song

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