Rose helped me get to the studio for a few hours last week, and I finished this oil painting. It’s a new version of an ink painting I created for my TEDx talk. It’s about a time in my life following a breakup where couples everywhere hurt to look at.

The title is from a poem The Butterfly Token by one of my favourite poets, Maurice Stradgard. I bought his book The Nailing of the Right Hand when I was about 13 from a huge book sale at the local library; the cover intrigued me, it had poppies. I fell in love with the poet and his beautiful poems about love, loneliness, self doubt. The book has been out of print for years, the only other book he published I’ve never seen available anywhere, even second hand. The author himself is almost certainly dead now, his domain name and WordPress site were bought years ago but never used. My book is hand signed and has been treasured. I was never able to find a way to send him a letter to say thankyou. I would never have heard of him or his work without that chance encounter. So much that is precious simply slips us by if we don’t look for it and treasure it when we find it. The whole world is a rain of beautiful, brilliant, illuminating treasures, fleetingly brief.