Before and after dawn ( possibly only of interest to those who take an interest in Bob Dylan) / A song from the distant past comes to mind / Where am I now?

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The truth was obscure, too profound and too pure To live it you had to explode And at the last hour of need, we entirely agreed Sacrifice was the code of the road

(Bob Dylan -- 1978) 

A Letter from 1978

"I fought with my twin, that enemy within, 'til both of us fell by the way."

"There's a white diamond gloom on the dark side of this room and a pathway that leads up to the stars. If you don't believe there's a price for this sweet paradise, remind me to show you the scars."

-- Bob Dylan, quoted from "Where Are You Tonight? (Journey Through Dark Heat), 1978"

Composer (1983) and Poem (1983)

and a poem: IN THE CHURCH OF THE HOLY CONTRADICTION WE LOOK FOR TEARS THROUGH A TELESCOPE 

Why should we go on watching each other through a telescope? -- Bob Dylan, Street Legal, 1978 

There is a drought and no messiah in sight 

Look at the thirsty land 

Look at the magnifying glass sun 

But no hand holds the glass 

No heart is moved by our sorrow 

Through a telescope we look for healing hands, 

A human heart, and eyes that shed tears. 

In drought and in deluge

These suns and gods 

Are distant 

Though amazingly graceful and near 

While we watch through telescopes 

Our church of sky, land and sea 

Fills with healing hands, 

Human hearts and eyes that shed tears. 

I couldn't remember the title of the above drawing until I found a list of drawings and paintings I had done that my mother had placed on the walls of their home. My mother chose this one for a place high on the wall in their living room, knowing that it was based on a photograph of Bob Dylan from the 1960s. Her title for it, though, which I did remember, was "The Judge." A friend of mine referred to it as the drawing of the "hockey player." The image is open to interpretation. When I drew this I was thinking of both Bob Dylan and Johann Sebastian Bach and Beethoven.  As I looked at this drawing for the first time in a long time, I remembered the poem I had written which was inspired by the words of a song written by Bob Dylan in 1978. When my mother died in 1994, the drawing came back to me.