Stendhal Syndrome "Stendhal syndrome" is a psychosomatic condition involving rapid heartbeat, fainting, confusion and even hallucinations allegedly occurring when individuals become exposed to objects, artworks, or phenomena of great beauty and antiquity. Wikipedia It might have been a mistake, perhaps he should have just stayed at the hotel. But this trip had been planned for years now as a sort of pilgrimage, this was the day he had set aside to pay his respects, and he decided to push on. He did not know when he would be back in Madrid, and he didn't want to miss this chance to finally see the great masterpiece, Picasso's Guernica, the timeless and towering Colossus of modern art, and he would not let the bad news he'd just received derail this moment. He allowed himself a late breakfast at a simple but lovely restaurant in the alley behind the hotel, and had planned to be at the museum by eleven. He stopped back at his room to use the bathroom, and saw the flashing red light on the phone. When he dialed for his messages, he heard a familiar voice from back in the States. "Hello, it's your brother. Mom passed away last night. We thought she was in remission, the treatments all seemed to be working and she was improving, but she collapsed in the apartment and was dead before she hit the floor. Lung cancer, heart attack, the vapors, whatever the fuck! The doctors are all insensitive imbeciles. I know you're traveling tomorrow, or the next day, I forget, so we'll wait for you to get back to New York before we have the memorial service. Dad's a mess. I'm a mess. Call me." Click. He called his brother but got voice mail. "Got your message. Returning tomorrow. I'll come straight to your office from the airport, probably mid-afternoon." He was in a fog as he walked to the museum. It seemed fitting that he would finally see Guernica, the painting he knew of and knew about since he was a child, because his mother had a beautifully framed print of it that she hung in the living room of every house they'd lived in. He knew the story, told again and again by his mother, the bombs dropped on a defenseless Basque town, Picasso creating the painting in a frenzied few weeks after the event, the artist's refusal to display the painting in Spain while Franco was in power, and its triumphant return to the Museo Reina Sofia for the world to see in its rightful place. As he wandered aimlessly through the lower galleries, he had the sensation of a hot fire radiating from the museum's impressive collection of Cubists and Surrealists. What was it about Spanish culture, he wondered, that rendered the real world inadequate to tell humanity's essential stories? When he entered the main gallery on the third floor, he braced himself for the painting he had come to see. He walked to the centre of the room and faced it directly, and was immediately overwhelmed. Bigger by far than he expected, almost impossible to take in all at once, it was simultaneously an achievement of breathtaking creative imagination, a searing depiction of the pain and anguish of war and the unassailable apex of anti-war art, the standard of intention and impact against which all art of significance would henceforth be measured, a new language of indelible imagery, a blast furnace of emotional power. He was transported. He was devastated. He looked down at his feet and sobbed. He looked up again, and heard the painting scream. He grew weak and light-headed, then fainted, hitting the floor with a crash. Alan Brickman Alan Brickman is a writer of short fiction. Raised in New York, educated in Massachusetts, he now lives in New Orleans with his 16-year old border collie Jasper, and can't imagine living anywhere else. Alan's fiction is soon to appear in Literary Heist (Ottawa, ONT, December 2021) and the Evening Street Press (Sacramento, CA, spring/summer 2022).
1 Comment
Joseph - 1940 Joseph and Lillian are caught in a moment. And something is about to happen. A decision about to be made. The warm summer breeze wafting through the open window of their tiny office is suggestive of their stirring emotions. Reckless passions. Lillian waits. Waits to pick up the paper she’s dropped. Waits for Joseph to justify himself or them. Joseph affects studying a claim made by Willard Norbert whose wife died leaving Willard with three children under the age of seven. It seemed a good risk at the time. Mrs. Norbert being so damn young. Management will be less than pleased about the loss. How do you insure someone against their fate, Joseph wonders? Against whatever happens next between himself and Lillian? Outside the window, Topeka, Kansas, is in the soft embrace of evening. Its hustle and bustle tempered by night. Folks have drifted home just as other like-minded creatures seeking their nests, burrows, dens. Seeking safety. Comfort. Joseph and Lillian remain afield despite the danger. Even though Joseph lives minutes away. On Arlington Street with his wife of eleven years—Martha, and two children ages ten and eight. A girl and a boy. And, of course, a mutt named Roscoe. One would think that’s enough. Lillian is Martha’s younger sister by three years. Martha insisted Joseph hire her to be his secretary though there was little enough work and even less pay. “She needs stability, Joe. You can give her that.” Martha encouraged him. That was three months ago. Through a long hot summer where much was revealed and little, finally, kept secret. Like Lillian’s dress, which clings to her as if an admission of guilt. There’s more here than meets the eye, it says. More than Joseph found comfortable. More than he could altogether ignore. “Thanks for taking me on,” Lillian told him—their first day working together. “I know it’s a favour, but I’ll do whatever it takes to make it worth your while.” The coquettish and instinctive grin. Lillian had recently returned from LA where she had been fondled and forgotten by the gatekeepers of every major and minor movie studio. One among many. A body and nobody at countless cattle calls. “A dime a dozen,” a pie-faced executive producer told Lillian, “and not even worth that much.” His pants down round his knees at the time. “How’s Lillian managing?” Martha asked at breakfast one week after her sister’s employment. “Better than I thought,” Joseph replied. “I mean she can actually type.” “We MacClures aren’t just pretty faces, you know.” Martha slipped two pancakes onto Joseph’s plate. “No, you’re magnificent bodies as well.” “Bodies?” Joseph extended an arm around his wife’s waist. Pulled her near. “Body, then,” he said and nuzzled her breast. “Your breakfast is getting cold, Romeo.” She smiled. Indulgent. And stroked Joseph’s straw-coloured hair. Love lingered in the gesture. A love she professed as a seventeen-year-old and yet today. “Got a kiss for me?” Joseph asked and sat Martha on his lap. “And more,” Martha murmured into his ear. They kissed. It was practiced, but not practical. And who knows what might have happened next if ten-year-old Emily hadn’t rushed into the kitchen? Martha left Joseph to his pancakes. And his conflicted thoughts. Some for his wife. Others for her sister. Emily switched on the radio. She wanted music. But outside their still arcadian household, outside Topeka—outside the United States—the world roiled in turmoil, and all Emily got was news. Today pronouncements of the French surrender to Hitler’s goose-stepping army. Those and other Nazi desecrations troubled Joseph, but they took place over four thousand miles away. Close at hand, Joseph faced a more immediate and escalating problem. He and Lillian’s proximity, forced by the size of the office, threatened the equilibrium of their lives. Crossing the room became a dance rife with possible indiscretions. Perfume comingling with aftershave. An ‘excuse me’ or ‘sorry’ would be called for and a quick aversion of Joseph’s eyes—Lillian’s décolletage calling attention to itself. Triggering imagination. Her legs sheathed with nylon stockings, which had become all the rage, seemed to invite touch. Over time, proximity led to familiarity: The straightening of a tie. The brushing of a cookie crumb from scarlet lips. The pushing back of stray hair. Hands incidentally grazing and holding there longer than necessary. An accumulation of gestures that apart could be laughed away, but all together wanted their voice. A month and more passed. Joseph began leaving for work early. In anticipation. In pursuit of something already his. Selling whole and term life insurance policies became more and more superfluous. And strangely easier. But, finally, not the reason Joseph went to the office anymore. Commissions and his circumstances be damned. Alone with his thoughts, he wondered at his growing obsession—imagined himself a character in a book. For it seemed to Joseph the course of his life had been taken from his hands. He was at the wheel, but somehow losing control. Why didn’t he put a stop to it? Why didn’t he yield, give way? If he had choices, why did it feel inevitable? Primal will pulled at him. Guilt transformed his character. He became less attentive and more unresponsive to his wife and children. September. Eating cold cereal for breakfast, Joseph sat at the kitchen table reading the sport pages. Martha brewed coffee. And her growing resentment. “What’s the score?’ Martha demanded. “Pardon?” “The score, Joe. What is the score?” “Baseball? College? Pros?” “Between us, damn it.” There sounded fury in Martha’s voice and nascent desperation. “Sorry. Didn’t think—.“ “I’m using language you might appreciate. Might respond to.” Joseph took care folding the paper and setting it aside. He understood it as a delicate moment. “Didn’t know we were playing a game,” he countered. “Hell, we’re not even on the same team these days.” Joseph considered possible ways to respond. This time. Appraised the effect of each. “Sorry,” he tried, “management is pressing us to write more business. It’s stressful-.” Martha cut him off. “You’ve used that before.” “Because it’s the truth.” “Then to hell with life insurance!” “You have seen my paychecks, Matty. That’s real money. It will get us out of debt and allow us to save for the kids’ education.” “So we do have a future.” “Of course.” Joseph’s declamation an affirmation without substance. ‘Then why don’t you act like it, Joe?! Why don’t you love me anymore?!” Hot tears brimmed over in Martha’s eyes. She didn’t mean to cry and wiped at their betrayal with clenched hands. Joseph stood—instinctively—habitually. Took one step toward his wife, but no farther. That will be remembered. By both of them. Emily rushed in. “Guess what day it is today, Dad,” she exclaimed. “Hey, kiddo.” Joseph swung his daughter around between himself and Martha—a shield—of sorts. “Give us a guess,” Emily insisted. “Let’s see. National Button Day.” “Come on. You’re not even trying.” “Labor Day,” David, Emily’s brother, chimed in from the living room. “And you don’t have to go into work. Isn’t that funny? Dads don’t go to work on Labor Day.” “I don’t get it,” David said joining his family. “What’s funny?” Joseph sat and flicked a quick look at Martha who had turned away from the proceedings. “Actually, I do have to go in. Got a couple of calls to make. Only time they agreed to see me,” he said more to Martha than the kids. “But, I’ll be back early and we’ll make some vanilla ice cream.” David jumped into his father’s lap. Emily came alongside. Joseph hugged them close. His children. Bright and effusive. Pride and joy. Walking them to church on Sunday morning a sweet satisfaction. Hurting them, hurting himself. But even that was no deterrence. “And invite Aunt Lillian,” David demanded. “Will do,” Joseph said giving his son a tickle. “I’ll see her today.” Martha shut a drawer with a telling emphasis. Husband and wife stuck each other with their eyes. A brief moment, but laden with provocation, accusation, denial and anger. It marked them. Indelibly. Another hairline crack in the foundation of their relationship. Another grievance underscored with regret. Still, some things propel us forward. The way clearly fraught with danger. The end surely untenable. And Joseph went to work with Lillian on Labor Day. And Lillian couldn’t help herself. She wore canary yellow and cobalt blue. Her full and insistent body radiating. Her ebony black hair swept away from the fine architecture of her face. They drove out of town toward Howard Millford’s farm. The day clear and crisp as birdsong. Motored along in mutual silence. Lillian had forgotten their map. But never mind. They both knew where they were headed. “What do you think of my dress?” Lillian asked. Joseph kept his eyes on the road. “It’s--bright. Suits you.” “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” She agreed and studied a fingernail. “I almost didn’t show up today.” “I’m glad you did.” “Honestly?” “Sure. I’m not as successful without you.” “Window dressing.” “You’re more than that, Lillian.” “How much more?” And there they were. Three innocuous words that exposed them to their purposes. Everything to this point innuendo. Play. This excursion a test of their resolve—one way or another. Joseph exhaled as if exorcising ghosts. Lillian took his hand. “I’m really confused, Joe. I want to be here, but shouldn’t be. I have these feelings. For Martha. The kids. But mostly for you.” “I know what you mean. I do.” “What can we do about it?” “Damned if I could say.” “But something must be said, Joe. About us.” “You’re my sister-in-law,” Joseph declared in an attempt to forestall their unhappy destiny. “So you’re telling me no.” “How can I?” “Yes! Exactly.” Joseph swung the Ford well off the road and brought it to a stop. He faced Lillian. “You’re a beautiful woman, Lilly,” he told her and meant something more. “Beautiful in ways that you could love me?” she asked. And the answer was yes. And the kiss bruising. A fierce expression of a passion that both wants itself and is distraught by the wanting. And it couldn’t be undone. Later, leaving Howard Millford to examine his life-expectancy charts, they played out the script of so many other errant couples and checked into a seedy roadside inn. Everything was revealed then. The exclamations of their coupling—their rush to consummation guttural and unrestrained. Fierce and unrelenting. What the flesh wants it must have. Exhaustion followed. Physical and emotional. And regret. It waited in the wings. They drove back to Topeka in silence. Both tallying up the cost of their trip. What was paid out. What was their return. Trying to balance the ledger. Calculate ways to conceal the debt. Joseph and his family made vanilla ice cream that afternoon. Lillian had a headache. Sent her regards. Joseph regaled Martha and his children with a story of Millford’s bull. “We were standing just off his front porch sealing the deal, when I felt this hot breath blowing on the back of my neck. I spun around to see what in heaven’s name--and there I was eye-to-eye with a king-sized, roan-colored bull. I froze in place. ‘Oh, don’t worry about Burt,’ Millford said, ‘he just wanted to say howdy.’ “ “Burt the Bull. Burt the Bull,” David shouted and galloped around the yard. Roscoe chasing after him. Martha offered a bemused smile for David’s performance. That evening Joseph and Martha lay together and apart. Martha knew. Joseph could sense it. Read it in the contours of her face. In the strain of her voice. She wept softly as he lay awake beside her. Gnawing at his guilt. Wrestling with finding fault. Cursing the capriciousness of life. The gods or—whatever—caring not a whit for a person’s petty schemes and plans. Insinuating temptations and trials at every turn. They have no mercy. Mercy and forgiveness are the province of humanity, he thought. If we don’t engage them, they won’t exist. He for himself. Martha for him. For what has happened and whatever will happen next. It’s evening of the following day. Lillian waits at the file cabinet. The door to the office is open, but she ignores it. For now. Joseph feels the weight of the moment on his shoulders. In his gut. A decision must be made. Perhaps if he simply sits there, it will be made for him. Perhaps Lillian will gather her things and walk out that door. But then what? Hasn’t Joseph already abandoned his wife and children? And what good is his pledge to love and cherish—to anyone—anymore? Something’s been broken. There was no way to insure against it. No matter binding claims to be made. Relationships come into flower and necessarily fall into seed. Isn’t that the way of things? Still, there’s a phone at Joseph’s elbow. He could call Martha and begin mending fences. He could turn to Lillian and say-. And it’s 1940. Paris has fallen to the Nazis. In Topeka love is being made and forsaken all over the city. Joseph notes that it cost Willard Norbert $1.30 a month for his wife’s $20,000 term life insurance policy. Strange, but Joseph has no policy for himself. Nothing for Martha if—when he leaves. Enough said. Gavin Kayner Gavin Kayner's prose, poems and plays have won numerous awards and appeared in a variety of publications. These include best one act play - Chameleon Circle Theater, first award for poetry - Arizona Commission on the Arts, and publications in Cricket Magazine, Heuer Publishing, UNC Charlotte Press, Passager and so forth. Congratulations to our Pushcart nominees this year! The Pushcart Prize is an annual anthology since 1976 recognising literary excellence in the small press. It was founded by such luminaries as Anais Nin, Paul Bowles, Joyce Carol Oates, etc. It is an extraordinarily difficult task to whittle down the countless contributions of our writers into six. We are most grateful to Alarie Tennille, our prize nomination consultant, who reads tirelessly throughout the year and makes suggestions for many of the prize categories. We would be lost without you, Alarie. To recognize the outstanding talent of our writers, we now nominate annually for Best of Net, the Pushcart Prize, Best Small Fictions, Best Microfictions, and the Fantastic Ekphrastic Awards. Please join me in congratulating this year's Pushcart nominees! Letter with Green Sky, by Brenna Courtney Sacred Crypt, by Portly Bard Widowhood, by Sandi Stromberg On Planet Set by Joseph Cornell, by Mary McCarthy February’s Loss, by Rebecca Weigold You Are Here, by Sheila Lockhart ** Letter with Green Sky I hope to God that you are silver all over. The dock is slick with ghosts and bird leavings, and winter has ballooned into a groaning, glacial brain, an animal of which even the brooding, secular face of St. John the Baptist would approve. I am curious to know where it is you keep your qualms. Mine are strung around the hip and jangle lightly as I walk. You would think they are some kind of dark burgundy, the colour of shame, but really, they are a lot like what you cannot see — that is, specifically, the sky which has so thoroughly crushed me into conjuring a reason to bear it. Someone wrote me with the confession that they no longer knew how to look at a flower, and, you, I’ve caught it too — the light beams wobble, fall off the eye and it’s like all that fever had been studiously misplaced. It’s the same with the moon, with trees, with flame. The silver of the waves. Perhaps you wear a rosary around the neck, like they tell you not to. Harbor a flair for rumination. The rowers whoop like prophets; I pocket the smallest echos. Their backs threaten rain. Brenna Courtney ** Sacred Crypt So well large windows frame eternal earth as art of sea and sky, of soil and rock, where cycle of decay will feed rebirth of life that briefly clings to waning clock. For elsewhere, you commemorate the works in gallery you see as sacred crypt where hope of immortality still lurks for those that found their eye and hand equipped to render fragile permanence as art bestilling what forever might be seen as all a witness speaking dared impart that conscience in its moment could convene as presence eyes unborn would later share with artist resurrected who was there. Portly Bard ** Widowhood "Yves [Tanguy] was my only friend who understood everything," —Kay Sage Devoted to the surreal, she wandered torturous mazes, painted empty scaffolding when her husband suddenly died. Depression and decreased eyesight haunted “Watching the Clock” and “Tomorrow is Never.” It was “The Passage” she didn’t want and yet brushed onto canvas. A woman shorn of lover-wife persona. The landscape of widowhood, its barren fields and rocky support. Her art’s geometry. She remained faithful curator of Tanguy’s art. Until she painted “The Answer Is No.” Until she chose a bullet, had their ashes offered to Brittany’s wild coast. Sandi Stromberg ** February’s Loss remembering Judah Your heart stopped and February collapsed under the strain of the news. A chill caw pierced my bones: There must have been something wrong…as though I had botched spinning a wool blanket. You were not a mistake. Not a mishap. Not a malfunction. Your body was the size of a down feather, finespun breath and skin… is loss any smaller when it is something small? Lullabies flapped and circled, alighted at my feet. I crowed your name as though my wails could bring you back, as though in frantically turning under the bitter ground I could find explanation, comfort, but the field only shuddered and gave up its dead while God watched in silence perched in the skeleton of ash. Rebecca Weigold ** On Planet Set by Joseph Cornell I don't have much to give, a few worn treasures on a weathered tray plucked from the ash heap of a broken life. Two shells the sea has polished into pearl, a row of glasses ready to hold tears or fine champagne, and two maps of heaven, the swirl of the milky way drawn like a scarf across night’s body, filled with stars that trace the outlines of gods and monsters measuring their way through centuries of sky, I offer you these as gift and invitation, emblem and souvenir of the plain magic that asks nothing more than wonder, the held breath of our most profound attention. Mary McCarthy ** You Are Here watching a bumblebee squeeze its furry abdomen into foxglove fingers you’re trying to work out how long it takes for a pollen molecule to travel from the soil up to its calyx you’re getting close but now you see another galaxy has formed a splotch of swirling grey in a pink universe how many is that now? you count them one two three five hundred and sixty seven and the letters too directing pollinators to the hidden source of happiness and why not you? a message for bees can’t be that hard to decode it’s alphabetical after all a matter of triggering the right responses now the rain splashes silver curtains smearing pink and cream blurring outlines its drops tap-tapping on cups their pipes vibrate with fugal harmonies truths which must be recorded with mathematical precision using special symbols on graph paper no easy task but the beauty of it oh the beauty of it makes you weep if only you could grasp its exactitude its magnificent systems everything would be clear there was a time you could enjoy simple pleasures of line patterns of colour as you would looking at an abstract painting no need to search for meaning everywhere until one day you started counting the number of flowers on each stem the number of bees ones twos threes stacking up behind your eyes and you began to see how every flower contains a universe that demands investigation how you could read their messages how they insisted on it you’ll have the answer worked out very soon you just need one more tiny calculation Sheila Lockhart (nominated by The Ekphrastic Review) A Study of Fixity Of all the things that can be attested to, and there are several, be it the accumulation of grey or the magnificence of points, not points of contention but of connection, the angles of heads and the tenderness of limbs, I find the most solvent to be the feathering of shadows, a flowering of the beginning of night, applied like a stain upon each life. All else to make of this is human contrivance, be it buckled shoe, banded rooster, savagery of smoke, or lure of curls, which leaves only light pouring toward us like the first glimpse of tomorrow. John Riley John Riley has published poetry and fiction in Smokelong Quarterly, Better Than Starbucks, Ekphrastic Review, Banyan Review, Connotation Press, Fiction Daily, The Molotov Cocktail, Dead Mule, St. Anne's Review, and numerous other anthologies and journals both online and in print. He has also published over thirty books of nonfiction for young readers and continues his work in educational publishing. We are looking for someone who cares about The Ekphrastic Review to help us promote our writers, archive of material, contests and other news on social media.
We need someone for our Facebook page who is willing to create a few posts a day on most days. If you are on Facebook and enjoy it, and have the time to share news and archive stuff on behalf of our contributors, we are waiting for you! We also need someone for Twitter. Ideally, we need someone who understands Twitter and enjoys it. I'm doing my best to use these tools to promote the great works in this journal, but I'm juggling many hats. I enjoy Facebook but have a tough time with Twitter. I know it is an amazing tool of connectivity and up to the minute literary living- if you are part of that pulse, and want to help promote our writers and grow and promote the journal, we would be most grateful. Please contact us at theekphrasticreview @ gmail.com. These are volunteer roles. We will thank you endlessly in public for your important work. Click here or on image above to view the selected responses for this prompt!
The Jelling Stones When Gorm the Old put up the first of these two runestones for his wife, the land was pagan. They’re under glass these days. A little church has stood beside them for a thousand years. His son put up the second, bigger stone: Harald Bluetooth, thinking of his parents. And this stone says he made Denmark and Norway his, made the Danes Christian. There is Christ entangled on its face above those runes, yet folks have thought of Odin on his tree to see Christ, arms outstretched, thus trapped in curls. The bright paint’s almost gone, but those who read the runes or images will learn of Harald. Another face shows what may be a snake, a lion in its toils. The runes beneath do not interpret. And the little church can’t tell you who these creatures are. They stood beneath the sky of Jutland long enough to shed the meaning they once had. The snake may have the upper hand, but they’re not done. John Claiborne Isbell Since 2016, various MSS of John’s have placed as finalist or semifinalist for The Washington Prize (three times), The Brittingham & Felix Pollak Prizes (twice), the Elixir Press 19th Annual Poetry Award, The Gival Press Poetry Award, the 2020 Able Muse Book Award (twice) and the 2020 Richard Snyder Publication Prize. John published his first book of poetry, Allegro, in 2018, and has published in Poetry Durham, threecandles.org, the Jewish Post & Opinion, and The Ekphrastic Review. He has published books with Oxford and with Cambridge University Press and appeared in Who’s Who in the World. He also once represented France in the European Ultimate Frisbee Championships. He retired this summer from The University of Texas – Rio Grande Valley, where he taught French and German and coached men’s and women’s ultimate. His wife continues to teach languages there. dance of stillness in the middle blue then greet the world a bridge is formed of one hand holding out to another the circle is full empty, full like breath looking back at you is the mirror of your own kindness mirror reflects empty circle of violet the space within you Bethany Rivers Bethany Rivers is author of two poetry pamphlets: the sea refuses no river (Fly on the Wall Press); Off the wall (Indigo Dreams); and a non-fiction book, Fountain of Creativity – Ways to nourish your writing (Victorina Press); and also editor of the online poetry magazine, As Above So Below. Bethany mentors writers of novel, memoir, poetry and short stories www.writingyourvoice.org.uk Frances Clarke has exhibited nationally and internationally including solo exhibitions at, Gateway Gallery, Shrewsbury (1994); Gallery Molenux de Gato, Albarracin, Spain (2004); Gallery Casa Monet, Spain (2006); and Difusora de las Artes, Valencia, Spain (2010). She has also been included in numerous group exhibitions, including Exhibition Title, Galleria Occidental y Oriental, Spain (2007); Exhibition Title, Gallery Taragila, Rome (2010); Exhibition Title, Vista e Comunicaciones, Rome, (2011); Exhibition Title, Museum de Cortina & Discute, Rome (2012); and Words for Art, The Assembly Rooms, Ludlow, England (2017). Clarkes work is included in significant private and corporate collections throughout the world including Bristol Children’s Hospital, Bristol, U.K.
Courbet and his Stonebreakers Decades before his political exile, the artist found his subjects by chance. Two tattered brown-clad workers smashing rocks to fist-sized chunks, carrying them stacked in flat baskets, out of sunlight up a shadowed slope. He painted them almost life size like grand figures from history or myth. The young man steadies his load on one thigh as if to shift his weight to climb the rubbly rise. His older comrade half-kneels on straw to hack at a landscape desolate as a battlefield or hell where tools, a cooking pot, and empty carriers lie strewn like seeds doomed to be sproutless in this place of toil. One corner of pale sky teases with the promise of reward—if only they can finish before full night falls. Some among us struggle from birth ‘til death at work the rest of us would never do. Most of those remain invisible unless some visionary grants a glimpse of who they were, what they did. Such irony: this painting burned to ash when Allied forces torched Dresden, one more hapless consequence of war’s horror, man’s unrelenting conceit. Mary Redman Mary Redman is a retired high school English teacher who currently works part time supervising student teachers for University of Indianapolis, volunteers at the IMA at Newfields, and enjoys frequent walks in nature. She has had poems published in Flying Island, Red River Review, Tipton Poetry Journal, Snapdragon: A Journal of Healing, Kaleidoscope, So It Goes, Issue 9, and elsewhere. One of her poems received a Pushcart nomination in 2019. |
The Ekphrastic Review
COOKIES/PRIVACY
This site uses cookies to deliver your best navigation experience this time and next. Continuing here means you consent to cookies. Thank you. Join us on Facebook:
Tickled Pink Contest
May 2024
|