Edythe Haendel Schwartz The Mapmaker –California, 2020 Pen tight in fist, she draws a map of streets that wind around the page, swirls of wind that lift the walls of fire over trees. Where Reese’s Dairy stood she draws a box of blackness, yellow daisies, grass around the box, draws a blackened chimney—once a house. Pen tight in fist, she fleshes out her sense of order, weighs each touch, as if to balance wear and fear with eye and hand— I draw my way through smoke, she quips, quiet the whooshing flames with loop de loops and jagged lines. She labors over bush and flourish, announces seeds take hold in ash—
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