The Ekphrastic Review
  • Ekphrastic Journal
  • About
  • Give
    • Merch
  • Book Shelf
    • Ekphrastic Book Shelf
    • Contributors' Book Shelf
  • Ebooks
  • Submit
  • Prizes
  • Ekphrastic Writing Challenges
  • TERcets Podcast
  • Writers
  • Contact

Sold to a Private Collection, by Darren Lyons

8/24/2018

0 Comments

 
Picture
Notary, by Jean-Michel Basquiat (USA). 1983.
Sold to a Private Collection
      
(on seeing Jean-Michel Basquiat's Notary)

            you put nothing on but you on canvas—oracle,
SAMO© [same old, same old]--
            tagged beat-down warehouses,
scrutiny from rats & bums, night owls, kin.

how is it to be mythic, now, over
             one hundred million dollars for clarifying desert dichotomies
with your blood traces, nerve sauce, & sinew?

              It’s you in paint, crayon. pundits talk of a fractured
psyche like they know of rags, but your speculations, of words-made-flesh, of PLUTO,
              belie their conclusions. You’re a planet, a god of death.

you saw & verbalized LEECHES, FLEAS, & PARASITES
               attacking the FLESH of a MALE TORSO,
kafka’s penal-colony machine made visceral.

               as you wished, you’re an African presence, a seer
confirming an existence some will pay for but never wash away,
               who will pay no mind but surely money.

you, nomad of your own body, finder of self-meaning,
               marks & gestures quickening within a caring eye, archaeologist,
lost to most in some private collection.

Darren Lyons

Darren Lyons is currently an MFA student in the Creative Writing Program of The New School in New York, NY.  Recently, his poems were published in Chronogram and The Inquisitive Eater, and a poetry/painting project of his was featured on The Best American Poetry Blog. One of Darren's short stories and another poem were published in the 2016 and 2017 editions, respectively, of Stonesthrow Review.

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    The Ekphrastic Review
    Picture

    ​​Find a writer, artist, or poem, etc. by searching here:
    PLEASE SUPPORT US
    Join us on FB and Twitter!
    Picture



    ​
    ​Archives
    ​

    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015

    Lorette C. Luzajic theekphrasticreview@gmail.com 

  • Ekphrastic Journal
  • About
  • Give
    • Merch
  • Book Shelf
    • Ekphrastic Book Shelf
    • Contributors' Book Shelf
  • Ebooks
  • Submit
  • Prizes
  • Ekphrastic Writing Challenges
  • TERcets Podcast
  • Writers
  • Contact