Again, always, they gather water 
in goatskins before dawn. 
A calligraphy of night, calling 
out to each other, laughing. 
Sometimes upbraiding. 
Trees yet a bank of mist. 
And the setting moon, 
raiser of tides, gives them 
its one coin of help. 

* Water Carriers on the Nile (oil on canvas, 1891) by American
expatriate artist John Singer Sargent (1856-1925)

Image downloaded from the Art Institute of Chicago, and appears
here under Creative Commons Zero (CC0) license:
https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/

[Sargent was a successful and prolific artist, producing more than 900 paintings
and 2,000 water colors. Of his now iconic Portrait of Madame X, he
commented: “I suppose it is the best thing I have done.”]

Bio: Daryl Scroggins