La Mente Malevola Finds a Good Home

My painting, La Mente Malevola, was recently acquired from the Portfolio Gallery and has finally found a good home. In celebration/commemoration I got the preliminary drawing, dusted it off, and made a completed drawing. Comparing the drawing to the painting, you can see that I eliminated the background female figure and gave the seated man a more spacious surrounding environment. The painting of the cat was adapted by a Picasso painting called “Cat attacking a Bird.” I changed the bird to a mouse to match the poem that I eventually wrote to accompany the painting. I still have yet to find a publisher for the book manuscript, Moments in Light and Shadows, that this poem is included it. It makes me think of trying to publish selected works from this manuscript again. To complete the drawing, I entered the cat once again into the painting behind the man’s head. A wonderful Christmas present, a book on the paintings of Kawanabe Kirosai helped with this composition. Kirosai made a very dynamic painting of a man riding a tiger. The writer noted the intensity of the work and attributed this intensity to Kirosai’s close juxtaposition of the man’s face with the tiger’s face. I tried this in my drawing, by putting the three heads in the composition very close together. The poem for La Mente Malevola: The Spanish Professor, black curls in his hair sank his aching bony body deeply into his hostess’ living room couch “I don’t believe in god,” he said, inhaling the capital “G” off the word. It sounded odd “But,” he added, “I do believe in La Mente Malevola” “He plays with us you know,” He said while waving his hand back and forth in the air His obsidian Rasputin eyes glowing with malevolent irony. “Like the cat plays with his mouse before killing it.” I laugh out loud at what I believe to be the utter facetiousness of this confession But an image is emblazoned in my mind - the image of La Mente Malevola - the malicious mind an evil force in the universe grinning down at the vulnerable like a rapacious cat beholding his impuissant prey How could anyone believe in such a god? I wonder A god with nothing better to do than intervene in the lives of men And why should a Mente Malevola even bother to waste god time playing cat games with worthless mortals? I wonder It seemed as ludicrous as believing in guardian angels silliness at either end of the metaphysical pole I think Then a three-day migraine visits my wondering brain Bright lights cut into my eyes sounds, however small, are translated into the language of pain that familiar thudding beat in my head like something batting back and forth like the cat that plays with his mouse before killing it La Mente Malevola stares down upon me from the cosmos his feline eyes gleaming with cruel desire and I believe in a mind of malicious intent