I look up, and there above me is the sky. If I take my time, more often than not, it is beautiful.

The sky has no intent. No politics nor plan. It fills with fragments from a far off place, with cloud, with rain, with smoke, with tiny particles of dust and living things, the weather, calm and strong.

The changing sky is beautiful, not just because of what I see, but feel, its nature, far above my own.

Beauty is not defined by being rare.

A small square watercolour of a tiny bird sits on my desk. Despite its stillness, I am struck by how this image of a wren is enough to capture its spirit, especially as I am drawn to its movement and song.

As I see a painting I am made different. The longer I gaze, the greater my difference.

I think and feel my way to a new place as the wren becomes far more than paper and pigment.

Art is not my luxury, it is the air I breathe, my food, my drink, my anchor, word, and memory.

I stir from sleep as high wind gusts throughout the night. In my brick house, under the covers, I am warm and safe. Each time I wake I fade to sleep with thoughts of those who huddle in doorways, under the howl of a bridge, a refuse shed, who rest as best they can between the cold concrete posts of a basement car park. I think of the birds, lighter than a tablespoon of salt, huddled in the hedge, waiting out the storm. I think of my father who, without his sister's love, would have been a homeless man.