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

St. Matthew and the Angel, by Eileen Mattmann

11/15/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
St. Matthew and the Angel, by Rembrandt (Netherlands). 1661.
St. Matthew and the Angel
        
From behind his right shoulder she leans
close by, hand resting lightly, wild hair a cascade,
daughter of earth and sky, lips
imparting revelation.
Perhaps she was there, invisible attendant
at the birth, hovering over tentative steps,
or one of the host who comforted in the desert
of temptation and grief.
 
The old man pauses, veined hand rising
to finger his beard, comes wisdom
in candlelight, far beyond his own poor
experience of life, dares to write
the unearthly story that threatens the social order,
lived by someone sacrificed for a world
unready to hear it.
 
No more ready are they in this newer age rife
with fear, pettiness, dreams for better, for words
he can barely comprehend himself, overwhelming
those who will read them, unmoored,
adrift in their fragility.
 
His hands cover his face, he works free the fatigue,
picks up the pen to write words distorted,
as they must be, by the lens of his humanity, mere
shadows of words, the mist, not the flood,
that bleeds through his pen to the page.
 
Eileen Mattmann

Eileen Mattmann’s poetry has appeared in several print and online poetry journals. She began writing poetry after a long teaching career.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    The Ekphrastic Review
    Picture

    ​​Find a writer, artist, or poem, etc. by searching here:
    Current Prompt
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    PLEASE SUPPORT US



    ​
    ​Archives
    ​

    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    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
    • Challenge Archives
  • TERcets Podcast
  • Writers
  • Contact