Barre Opera House Exhibition
On Sunday, March 30, 2025 the TURNmusic Ensemble & Mary Bonhag will perform Penelope, a Song Cycle at the Barre Opera House. Mr. Zorn has donated four of his acrylic on canvas paintings that will be available by an auction following the performance. The lobby of the Opera House will feature an exhibition of Mr. Zorn’s art. Penelope, a modern song cycle explores relationships, compassion and healing. It is a meditation on memory, identity, and what it means to come home. The art on display will be inspired by, and will reflect, what the audience will have experienced.
March 4th - 30th: View the art exhibition by calling the Barre Opera House in advance 802-476-8188 to make arrangements to visit.
Contra Dance
60x48 Acrylic on Canvas, For TURNmusic auction
Poem 1 - The Stranger with the Face of a Man I Loved, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
This poem emphasizes the painful recognition of someone who is both familiar and distant, physically present but emotionally absent. The rhythm and repetition reinforce the weight of time, of a love that once was but is now fractured beyond repair. The rhythm is sharp and cutting, Contra dancing, normally danced in straight lines, not so in this visual interpretation. The straight lines now changed into randomness, now “dancing” on the canvas with reckless abandonment.
1. The Stranger with the Face of a Man I Loved
I have a house
Looks out to sea
And this is where he came
The stranger with the face of a man I loved
To the house by the sea
Long time, long time gone
A sort of home
It’s this house
That what’s left of his mind
Seems to have remembered
So what’s left of his mind
Claims the house as his
Though it’s been mine and mine alone since he left me here
In this house
Where the best of our times
I try to remember
And the rest of the time
I try to forget
The times he lied and lied
Before he just left me here
The stranger with the face of a man I loved
In the house by the sea
Long time, long time gone
A sort of home
He left me here
Half a life ago
But this is where he came
The stranger with the face of a man I loved
Remember This Song?
60x36 Acrylic on Canvas, $1,600.00
Poem 2 - This is What You're Like, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
The imagery of music and dancing of someone continuing even after the song is gone. “Where is it you’ve gone? How can I find you?”
2. This Is What You’re Like
I’d give a lot
I’d give a lot to hear him
tell me lies like that again
tell me much of anything.
It’s true, he talks
It’s true, he talks, but it’s not
Anything like it was then
Anything like it was
when he talked the way a bird sings,
just to sing.
This is what you’re like
Do you remember?
This is what you once were like.
You are a man who when the music dies away
You keep on dancing
And when there’s nothing left to say
You tell me lies
You wrote a poem
You wrote a poem about me
Swimming in the open sea
You loved my eyebrows and my stomach and my knobby knees
I loved your mouth
I loved your mouth and every story that you told to me
Where is it you’ve gone?
How can I find you?
I heard you weeping in the dawn
But you won’t say if I can bring you back alive
I’ll come and find you
I can’t help thinking you survived
Just went astray.
This is what you’re like
Try to remember
This is what you once were like
Where is it you’ve gone? How can I find you?
Where is it you’ve gone?
Do you remember, you are a man who
Told me you loved me
You are a man who told me you loved me,
Do you remember?
Just A Thought
16x29 Acrylic on Canvas, $550.00
Poem 3 - The Honeyed Fruit, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
An agent of oblivion is both beautiful and ominous, its sweetness making the sorrow of forgetting. “Like children carried off from their calling mothers"
3. The Honeyed Fruit
The honeyed fruit they offered dripped forgetfulness. Those who tasted it fell where they were, dreaming, their faces smeared smiling with the sweetness of the end of any desire for home. I drove them, weeping, to their rowing benches and tied them in, but still they moaned, straining to look back over their shoulders at the disappearing shore, like children carried off from their calling mothers.
Red Dawn
24x36 Acrylic on canvas, On loan
Poem 4 - The Lotus Eaters, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
This poem conveys a deep sense of longing, loss, and emotional conflict. The repeated phrase—"The stranger with the face of a man I loved"—emphasizes the painful recognition of someone who is both familiar and distant, physically present but emotionally absent. The imagery of the house by the sea serves as a symbol of both refuge and haunting memory, a place where love once thrived but also where betrayal and abandonment left their mark. The rhythm and repetition reinforce the weight of time, of a love that once was but is now fractured beyond repair.
4. The Lotus Eaters
Down the ward, the men are dreaming,
drooling in their cots.
Pricks of blood in every elbow,
I am no better.
It’s just that I’m awake
It’s just that I’m awake and walking.
Walking.
Hear my footsteps down the hall.
Now I’m smelling the night air,
crunching gravel as I walk, walk, walk.
Never, never, never, never will I
never will I sleep like that again
Never, never, never, never, never,
Never will I sleep like that, sleep like that…
And I’m lost in this night
I’m lost in this night
I’m already lost, but not as lost as them
And I’m lost in this night
I’m lost in this night
I’m already lost, but not as lost as them
my sleeping, drooling, smiling men
I’m not as lost,
I’m not as lost
I’m not as lost as them.
Into The Night
24x36, Acrylic & Chalk on canvas, For TURNmusic auction
Poem 5 - Nausicaa, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
“Just take my hand … And I will lead you home,” going into a moment of suspended fate. Recognition and reassurance expressed visually in a mostly monochromatic pallet, shades of black and gray. Scratches of white, to guide the viewer.
5. Nausicaa
Don’t be afraid, Stranger
I’m not afraid,
I’m not afraid of you.
You look so lost, Stranger
But you’re not lost,
‘Cause I’ve just found you.
Just take my hand, Stranger
Just take my hand
And I will lead you home.
Centering
60x48 Acrylic on Canvas, $1,600.00
Poem 6 - Circe and the Hanged Man, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
Having an almost mythical quality, reminiscent of Norse and esoteric traditions. Exploring themes of sacrifice, perception and transformation, using the imagery of a ball hesitating at its peak to illustrate a moment of suspended fate. “So that’s me” as if the stranger is coming to term with their own journey
6. Circe and the Hanged Man
“Is he dead?” the Stranger said
No, she tells him.
Say you bounce a ball
Have you ever noticed that
Between the business of its going up
and the business of its fall
it hesitates?
It just waits
There’s a fraction of a second there
when it’s luxuriating in the air
Before its fate rushes it on.
“But he’s hanging there”
Yes, he’s hanging, yes, but from the tree of life
“Is he some sort of sacrifice?”
Yes, he’s a sacrifice…
He gave himself to himself so he could see.
He gave himself to himself so he could see.
He gave himself to himself so he could see.
He gave himself
“So he could see?”
As only you can see
When the world is upside down
And you hang
From the branch of a tree
“So that’s me?”
Yes, it’s where you seem to be.
And you hang from the branch of a tree.
“So that’s me?”
Yes, it’s where you seem to be.
“So that’s me.”
Weight of Absence
20x16 Acrylic on Canvas, $500.00
Poem 7 - I Died of Waiting, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
Aching with the tension between longing for home and the relentless grasp of the world that refuses to release its hold. “The world wants her traveler to stay lost”
7. I Died of Waiting
He says, “Oh, Mother, I am so sad to see you here. I didn’t know. What happened to you?” She says, “I died of waiting. Year after year, I stood the days out, squinting across the water that never showed your sail. One day my hollow heart cracked to powder like an old egg and I fell where I stood, eyes still clinging to the empty horizon.” Bitter with longing Odysseus reaches out to his mother. Three times he tries and three times he fails. She is as untouchable as smoke. He says, “Oh, Mother, why can’t I hold you in my arms? Is this some fresh cruelty the gods devised to trick me?” She says, “It is only death, my son. It is the end we all come to. You and I had our last embrace long ago, in the sunlit world above. Such things can never happen here. Go back, my child. You will be here soon enough, and that is a return I shall not rejoice to see you make.”
At The Lake
24x36 Acrylic on canvas, For TURNmusic auction
Poem 8 - Home, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
The repetition of “no, no, you can’t go home” intensifies the feeling of entrapment… The idea that “the world wants travelers to stay lost” evokes a sense of indifference , the journey itself is the point not the arrival. These thoughts express visually by adding black paint over previous shades of white with all being removed each time I visited the canvas for many months.
8. Home
Home is where I’m going, but never coming
Home is someplace I can’t recall, but head for still.
Across the waste of water I search for her,
Dear blue land,
show your blessed curve
So tiny and only mine.
No, no, you can’t go home, she says, the world,
where do you think you’re going?
We’re not done with you.
No, no, you can’t go home, she says, the world,
where do you think you’re going?
We’re not done with you.
The world is never done with you.
The world wants her travelers to stay lost.
The world swats their eyes as they run through it,
She grasps at them, pulling and tugging,
She grasps at them.
No, no, you can’t go home, she says, the world, where do you think you’re going?
We’re not done with you.
No, no, you can’t go home, she says, the world,
where do you think you’re going?
We’re not done with you.
The world is never done with you.
Not you.
Forgotten
16x20 Acrylic on Canvas, $500.00
Poem 9 - Dead Friend, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
“Dead friend, turn you back on me” a plea and a command- an attempt to sever the bond that lingers between the living and the lost. “I’ve forgotten you / Forget me”
9. Dead Friend
Dead friend
Turn your back on me
I beg you
Do not look at me
With those eyes
Dead friend
I must leave you here
I can’t stay
You can’t follow me
Where I go
Dead friend
Turn your back on me
Let me go
I’ve forgotten you
Forget me
I’ve forgotten you
Forget me
Dark Box
20x16 Acrylic on Canvas, $550.00
Poem 10 - Calypso, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
Quiet sorrow and loneliness capturing a moment of upended grief. “She’s alone again” and “She looks for him in darkness” as though she has been here before and will be here again. “Where could he go , without her?” the raw disbelief that comes with loss, the way absence feels impossible to accept.
10. Calypso
But I do think of her
Standing in that parking lot
The stars are out, night drops down on her
She is alone again.
She’s alone again.
She holds his cooling dinner in her lifted hand.
Something he just might like
Sweet or salty, no one will eat it now.
She looks for him in darkness,
stands alone now once again
tries to see where he might have gone,
where could he go,
She looks for him in darkness,
stands alone now once again
tries to see where he might have gone,
where could he go, without her.
Serious Cirrus
48x36 Acrylic on Canvas, $1,600.00
Poem 11 - And Then You Shall Be Lost Indeed, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
Capturing the ominous weight of prophecy in The Odyssey…the tension between fate and free will “They dapple his island slope like bank of clouds”
11. And Then You Shall Be Lost Indeed
Tiresias prophesies for Odysseus in the Underworld:
I know you, Captain, all you want in this world is to see the honey light of your own home at last. But there is more trouble to come for you. Poseidon hates you and your way home is through him. He will make it hard for you yet. But if you can hold fast to restraint, there is some hope. You shall find yourself sailing past the Island of the Sun God. Helios, who sees all and hears everything. Helios, from whom nothing is hidden. See his many cattle, sacred to the world, they dapple his island slopes like banks of clouds. They are beautiful and they are holy. But Captain, let no one interfere with them, even if you’re starving. If any man so much as touches them, everything will be taken from you, all your men, your last ship, everything. And then you shall be lost indeed, your fine mind will be useless against the fury of the sun.
She’s Wonderful
60x36 Pastel on Canvas, $1,600.00
Poem 12 - Open Hands, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
The rhythm is sharp and cutting, each line presenting a small haunting revelation. The contrast between the physical (“broken bit of who knows what”) and the intangible (“what I thought I wanted “) deepens the sense of disconnection.
12. Open Hands
Here’s an ugly little something,
Broken bit of who knows what
Here’s a bloody little secret
What I did and what I thought
Here is what I lost forever
Open hands, a certain laugh
Here is what I thought I wanted
Some lost smile in a photograph
Moon, Deep Into The Woods
36x46 Acrylic on canvas, For TURNmusic auction
Poem 13 - Baby Teeth, Bone and Bullets, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
“Let a wind come / Let a wind come, blow it all away. Blow it all, all away”. As the moon tires the earth, we may escape the inescapable in the new light of day. The viewer woods in magenta hues with blackened barked trees, layered deeply. Your random thoughts remain your own as you gaze into the night sky.
13. Baby Teeth, Bone and Bullets
Let a wind come
Let a wind come blow it all away
Let a rainstorm
Let a rainstorm swallow me
Can’t you do that?
Can’t you hide me, God?
Can’t you…
Save me from you
(save me from you)
Sweep me someplace you can’t see
(Hide me some place)
I am known here
(God help me I’m known)
Open eye, open eye staring down on me.
Yellow sky, yellow sky staring down on me.
I am known for what I am.
I am known by you
(Let a wind come and blow it all away)
I am known by you
(Let a rain storm, let a wind come, and blow it all away)
I am known by you
(Let a rain storm, let a wind come, and blow it all away)
Can’t you…
Save me from you
(save me from you)
Sweep me someplace you can’t see
(Hide me some place)
I am known here
(I am known by you.)
Backwards and Forwards
60x36 Pastel on Canvas, $1,600.00
Poem 14 - As He Looks Out to Sea, from Penelope, Text by Ellen McLaughlin
Connecting Poetry as Art
This piece has a raw, fragmented quality that mirrors the feeling of loss and regret it conveys. The rhythm is sharp and cutting, each line presenting a small, haunting revelation.
The contrast between the physical (“broken bit of who knows what”) and the intangible (“what I thought I wanted”) deepens the sense of disconnection, as though the speaker is sifting through pieces of something irretrievably gone. The phrase “bloody little secret” carries a sense of guilt or consequence, something unspoken but heavy. The final image—“some lost smile in a photograph”—is especially poignant, capturing the way memories become ghosts, forever frozen but unreachable.
14. As He Looks Out to Sea
It moves like a live thing in his hands
The story, his story
Bloody and sacred, truth and lie,
The story, his story
And it tells itself,
the pages turn and tell themselves,
Backwards and forwards,
Backwards and forwards,
Backwards and forwards like the tide.
Your Blessed Curve
48x12 on Acrylic on Canvas, On Loan