#ekphrastic poem

[amalgamationink]

a eulogy for my son, who will not hear it

I would say “you’ll understand when you’re older”, but I suppose therein lies the rub. I would explain myself— tell you the grown-up truths of regret and shame and survival, and the fact of the matter being that all children are inevitably failed by their parents so, forgive me, but you’re lucky that I got it out of the way so quickly and made a spectacle to boot— but I should have done that when you still had ears. And anyway it’s rude to talk with your mouth full. Something else I would have taught you if I’d only had the time.

If it’s any consolation, they will not look kindly on me. I will be the monster who consumed his son, who knelt in a bloom of copper and salt and tore the babe to shreds. There is little room for nuance when I am stuffed so full of flesh. Did you know that it was you or me? Parenthood is about sacrifices, and I couldn’t bear to lay myself upon the altar. Forgive me. They are welcome to their judgement. When they discover the knives in their backs, gifts from their precious lambs, they will understand. Or they won’t. I won’t ask.

It was you or me, you know. You had my eyes, my mouth, my hunger. These were gifts from my father, once, and he fell at my hands for them. Blood of my blood, flesh of my flesh, forgive me — I could not play his part for you. Your gifts were mine to give, and mine to repossess. The revolution ends with me. I have done what I must to survive you. Part of you will survive with me, resting somewhere in the caverns of my gut. We will share the blame. You couldn’t help your birthright. I couldn’t let you keep it. Believe it or not, this hurt me more than it hurt you.

I picture you serene. Better than picturing you headless, bloodied, between my fingers. In the depths of me, there is a quiet peace, drowning the sense memory of the snap of your spine. The fruit of my loins had tender skin, and it burst ripe and sweet between my teeth. Even in my grief, my mouth waters. They will say that my consumption has cost me the right to mourn, but nothing else can hurt you now. I have saved you a lifetime of little agonies. It was violence as an act of love, a shield from harm. It was you or me. It had to be me. You understand. I know you do. Forgive me.

(inspired by Goya's painting, Saturn Devouring His Son).

[helenewate]

Beautiful Death

—after Botanica No. 23 by Gail Potocki

Bursting.

I am bursting at the seams. From within me, a rustle of leaves.

My skin severs, there becomes two of me. It stings, this gruesome separation of being.

Cold air floods my open wound, and I begin to bleed.

Blooming.

A buddling, from every last pump of my heart; each beat, a sproutling in the cavity.

Desecration pollinates my bloodstream. Death parrots the stench of beauty.

Begging.

There are roots in me and they are plenty.

I cannot contain them all, who must I beg for mercy?

Even in death, they will beautifully defile me.

— helene wate, aka olivia garrett

[atompowers]

Why so much life? I don’t know what to do with less I have given up all I have.

—Ilya Kaminsky, A Walking Man

From a new poem in partnership with the National Gallery of Art: A Walking Man by Ilya Kaminsky

“Giacometti is not working for his contemporaries, nor for the future generations: he is creating statues to delight the dead.” –Jean Genet

[hotwraithbones]

Continuous Cities 6 (A continuation of Italy Calvino’s Invisible Cities) by Ami J. Sanghvi

—Published in Prometheus Dreaming Magazine’s 2019 Prometheus Unbound anthology; semifinalist 🥀🌹

[bunnybearblogs]

Two Rivers

One of red, one of white

Forever running side by side.

Opposing currents that take travelers far away.

Always going,

Going,

Going.

The rivers ebb and flow

Sometimes sluggish and slow.

Other times rushing and racing.

Always going,

Going,

Going.

They go anywhere and everywhere

On fantastic journeys to places rare.

Just ride the currents that are

Always going,

Going,

Going.

[loveisadonkey]

Van Gogh Forgetting to Breathe While Furiously Painting Trees

An unfinished poem. Ready to grow, we’ll see where it goes:

[Van Gogh Forgetting to Breathe While Furiously Painting Trees]

Unable to express their fears

they burst at the seams.

So he paints them bright

without mouths

[ek-phrase-is]

The Lament For Icarus (1898) by Herbert Draper

The Lament of Icarus

The stories will tell you

That my wings were fragile

That my feathers were bound with wax

And the heat of the sun was my demise

But as I lay here in the laps of my would-be saviors

I find my wings intact

I am still blinded from the sun

But under my hands

They feel the same as they did

In my father’s workshop

Soft and strong and free

The stories will tell you it was my hubris

And the heat too close to the sun

But the truth is that my hands are weak with chill

My toes bitten with frostbite

My skin chafed by icy wind

Apollo is not a warm god

When he showed himself to me the first time

It was in a dark corner of our prison

Shrouded in shadows and frost

I did not believe he was the sun

He whispered the idea of wings

Into my father’s ear

As I watched from that same corner

Eager to be free

Free with him

He told me the sky would be warm

He told me I would make it high enough

If I could just make it high enough

He would bring me home to him

The tips of my fingers are wet

From the ice dripping from my feathers

And the ocean I plummeted so far into

This stone, even shaded by cliffs

Is warmer than my sun god ever was

My would-be saviors are crying, now

Nymphs, maybe, or dryads

One with her arm beneath my head

Her skin, cooler than any human’s would be

Is warmer than mine

With her hand pressed to my ribcage

She can tell my oh-so-human heart

Isn’t beating

In the shade of these ivory cliffs

I am shielded from Apollo himself

His glare

But I can still feel his gaze

He knows I am dead

Perhaps he meant it that way

Perhaps I was an idle game of gods

Or perhaps

He intended to free me

From the cold grasp of life

Into the warm cradle of death

[tryst-art-archive]

Poetry Class Final Compilation: [The title's long so it's below]

(May 2011; this was previously "Untitled, 2011")

Untitled, 2003 (of which there are actually several, it turns out)

Nurses grow poppies –

            or tomatoes.

A nurse grows,

and there are lions and boars –

            birds of prey –

they have each other’s bodies –

            men with feline faces and breasts

under the bristles of hogs –

they are the aphids on our tiger lilies.

Pluck a Chinese dragon from

the branches of your staring poppy/tomato plant;

            tell me that it does not swoon!

for it is beneath your iron grasp, and –

that smug smirk of yours;

why do you detest nature? –

give me the zodiac animal, and

            I shall save him from the jeers

of your raucous bulbs. Go –

grow your flowers elsewhere, sweet nurse;

            there is no call for talking fruit.

[ivors20]

I Am Going To Die

I Am Going To Die

Featured Image Above; ‘Waiting for Rainfall – Winton Wetlands, a painting by Geelong Artist/Poet, Jo Curtain, and the image was this weeks Geelong Writers Inc. Ekphrastic Photo Prompt, that subsequently inspired my ‘morbid’ poem below I Am Going to DieI am a fish out of water Writhing and flopping In this polluted puddle Splosh! Another toxic garbage bag Squelches by How did I ever…

[batgovernor]

Ekphrastic poem: Jenna Le, 'Patti Smith, 1976'

Ekphrastic poem: Jenna Le, ‘Patti Smith, 1976’

This photo, black-and-white, where Mapplethorpe portrays his dark-mopped ex in profile, seated nude on wooden floorboards, knees drawn up to hide her breasts to hide her nipples, heated by the sideways radiator pipes on which she rests her palms, her bulging ribs a set of parallel oblique gray stripes rippling her bare white skin, unsmiling lips a short flat line– these were my first parameters,…

[creatediana]

“Old Henry” - a Shakespearean sonnet and ekphrastic poem based on Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet (2009) by Jamie Ford, written 3/31/2016

[whirlsofwords]

DAY AND NIGHT AT THE PARTHENON

Everything that was broken is still broken,

in a different shade. The city in the distance is

almost nonexistent now, except the little chain of lights—

more proof of life than when it was visible. Did the

Old World have a word for all these blues?

Wine-dark and wine-glistening and wine-smooth.

The wine-shine where your eyes have adjusted.

The wine-barrel of fading empty space. Everything

that was standing is still standing, in a different shade.

Day and night at the Parthenon. Yoshida Hiroshi, 1925.

[mftulin]

Video Poem: A Reluctant Moses Took the Staff by Mark Tulin

Video Poem: A Reluctant Moses Took the Staff by Mark Tulin

Many thanks to ArtMusing for publishing this poem online. Featured artwork by “God Appears to Moses in Burning Bush.” Eugène Pluchart, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. For more video poems, please visit Poetry by the Sea.

[samw3000]

The False Mirror

How perceptive was I ...The apple withered on the treeThrough frosted windows The soul you cannot seeA deceptive beauty The False Mirror by Rene Magritte – 1928 Photo by Abderrahmane Meftah on Unsplash © 2024 Samantha Williams. All Rights Reserved. OpenLinkNight #360 Thank you, Grace and the dVerse team!

[thirdwednesdayorg]

Two Poems by Donald Pasmore

[ek-phrase-is]

The Fallen Angel (1847) by Alexandre Cabanel

The Fallen God

Does the ivy sting his feet?

His ankles, his calves?

Poisonous and sharp

But not as sharp as his gaze

It was Her that made him fall

God’s gaze is no less biting

But far more powerful

She will not turn a blind eye

To his creations

Perfect, you were

She claims

His wings shimmering and vivid and cool

So far from the heat he will find himself in

Perfect

Her voice disparaging, distant

Until unrighteousness was found in you

Struck down for pride, She says

He is too prideful of himself

Prideful of the self She created

Made in Her image, long before Eve

Or Adam

Prideful of his creations

His eyes sting with tears

As the ivy stings his feet

Is the ivy one of Her creations?

Or one of his?

Are we made in Her image?

Or in his?

And the others do not look

They reach for each other

As he reached for them

Grasping and pleading and begging

For someone to save him

They do not dare go against Her

The way he had

They do not think of him

They will not

Not until he raises

An army of his own

To take back his throne of creation

With a force made in His image

And a scepter wound in the same ivy

He will storm

Not yet, though

Soon He will rise

Until then

The ivy stings His feet

His ankles, His calves

And He thinks

Of how He will strike god down

For her crimes

Of uncreation