What I liked about the picture is that the other trees are turned to ashes - the fire motif - better to burn out than to die out.

I see what the Romans called lacrima rerum - lit. 'tears for things' - the inherent sadness of the profound truth that nothing lasts - I hate that - I rebel against it, albeit in vain, but everything inside me says it ought not be so.

I remember seeing a comet back in the late 90's and reading in the paper that we wouldn't be around when it returns in 4,000 yrs. My first response? Speak for yourself. I know it's absurd and we are pathetically mortal and fallible and in my more poetic moments I accept and even like that, but generally I hate it.

Yes, life overwrites her canvases as we overwrite our memories - I say more about that in my novel, A Familiar Rain, and yes, Nature abhors a vacuum, but I can't always say I agree with whatever Nature uses to fill up that void.