With Arthritis Hands Poem by Mark Heathcote

With arthritis hands like balls of knotted wool
Maud Lewis painted just what she liked.
With paint squeezed straight from the tube
On boards of wood, she would cut herself

Her miniature artworks are a means of self-expression.
Of her Ohio, Nova Scotia life out in the wilderness
She loved the railroad outside the family home.
The Baptist church appeared against the clouds.

Her blue shadows, images painted in the snow,
Show a willingness to live and survive.
No, you can't give up out here!
You got to smile and look up.
Nothings impossible
If you learn that subsistence is a painter's gift.

Maud loved the hustle and bustle of the locomotive.
The people thereabouts where she would sell fish
And she would sell painted Christmas cards
Life was tough, but painting was a means to uplift.
Others and, more importantly, herself, soul and body.