There's a Painter with a Canvas — An adult roadside painter creates a Central Valley scene so vivid that painted birds, orchards and turquoise river patterns flow into the landscape

The songbook

There's a Painter with a Canvas

Words by Douglas Heyes Jr. Listen to the recorded versions and follow the lyric below.

Original Doug Heyes lyrics · AI-generated music & vocals

A painter working in a hidden meadow understands her gift as a guiding presence shared by everyone. The narrator remembers her songs, the families who cared for her and the quiet moment of her death. Returning years later, he finds her painting again in a vision that keeps creation and remembrance inseparable.

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Recorded versions

3 recordings. Different voices and arrangements bring another side of the song into the light.

Lyrics

There's a Painter with a Canvas

Words by Douglas Heyes Jr

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There's a Painter with a canvas
In a hidden Meadowland
With the fingers on her left
She can steady her right hand
So much of it is wonderful
But never like she planned
The Painter with her canvas
In the hidden Meadowland

She started off with Sunrises
And Sunsets on the shore
Dazzling with color
Forever fine and pure
You can hear her singing
Down the Canyon in the Wind
A Painter in the Meadow
As another day begins

She came from the Old Country
By Royal Proclamation
She brought with her an easel
And no formal education
She said her hand was not her own
That she was never all alone
A Voice inside to guide her
Until she can go home

When I got to know her
I was very, very young
I lived down below her
In the Valley of the Sun
The Families around her
Would bring her everything
The Children would surround her
And listen to her Sing

Come gather now around me
I'll tell you what I know
There's something inside me
That shows me where to go
The same one lives inside of you
You already know it's true
The Painter lives inside me
Like She lives inside of you

We spent the night together
We lay there side by side
Staring at the Heavens
And the Universe inside
I just held her quietly
As she just slipped away
And the stillness and the silence
Had their way ~~~

I came back to the Meadow
It was just the other day
Everything was different
But nothing much had changed
Something in the air up there
Was very, very strange
I heard a sound and looked around
I thought I heard my name

That's when I heard her singing
I knew her voice so well
It was like the ringing
Of the old church bell
Then she look at me and smiled
Good to see you, my old friend
And the Painter in the Meadow
Was Painting once again

© Douglas Heyes Jr. All rights reserved.