Vincent

Starry, starry night
Paint your palette blue and grey
Look out on a summer's day
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul
Shadows on the hills
Sketch the trees and daffodils
Catch the breeze and the winter chills
In colours on the snowy linen land

Now I understand
What you tried to say to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free
They would not listen
They did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen now

Starry, starry night
Flaming flowers that brightly blaze
Swirling clouds and violet haze
Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue
Colours changing hue
Morning fields of amber grain
Weathered faces lined in pain
Are soothed beneath the artists' loving hand

Now I understand
What you tried to say to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free
They would not listen
They did not know how
Perhaps they'll listen now

For they could not love you
But still your love was true
And when no hope was left inside
On that starry, starry night
You took your life as lovers often do
But I could have told you Vincent
This world was never meant for one as beautiful as you

Like the strangers that you've met
The ragged men in ragged clothes
The silver thorn of bloody rose
Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow

Now I think I know
What you tried to say to me
And how you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free
They would not listen
They're not listening still
Perhaps they never will...

i adore don mcLean's version of "vincent". i wonder what van gogh would say if he heard this song. will he go "oh i'm so touched! finally someone understands what i went through!"? or will he disagree with it? ("what? i wasn't saying anything to you for goodness sake!") or will he do nothing else but cry?

i guess we'll never know.

there are artists in this world who reproduce his paintings mindlessly. none of them experience his emotions. none of them see the world with his eyes. none of them have a mind like his. he painted what he saw, not with a clear mind, but with a hazy and swirled mind, which explains his unique and trademark style. i don't think he expected anyone to copy him. to paint like him is one thing, to think and see like him is another thing.

we may go "ooh van gogh is my favourite artist! i want to paint like him!". but maybe next time we can stop to think. van gogh had suffered so much to come to this stage. we don't own such a trampled soul like his. even before his death, he was still madly painting. they called him a lunatic then. but right now, he's our celebrity. he's someone no one else can be.

please don't try locking yourself up in an asylum and paint all day. you can never be the next vincent van gogh.


there she goes
7:59 PM