Christina Lying in the Grass, by David Ross Linklater

Christina's World, by Andrew Wyeth (USA). 1948.

Christina Lying in the Grass

With green eyes rises from her dream,
imprints of sleep fade from her skin.
She stands, walks to the door.
Window sills have wept flakes of paint
in the long wind. She pushes it open,
floors flowered with coloured wallpaper,
a stack of kindling piled by the fire place.
An open diary reads Paint Christina.
One glass bottle of ketchup on the table,
a deep red and nothing else bar the bird
dangling between house and shed
muzzled with brush strokes.
Christina wakes, walks.
I had the strangest dream.
I was a bird with broken wings
crawling through the dirt.
He who painted and ended her,
full of useless bones and flowing hair,
framed her like a man frames a woman
in his mind, unequalled.
From the shining blades she wakes.
I had the strangest dream.

David Ross Linklater

David Ross Linklater is a poet from the Highlands of Scotland living in Glasgow. He is a graduate from the University of Glasgow's Creative Writing MLitt. He is the recipient of a Donald Dewar Arts Award and was shortlisted for a New Writers Award in 2015. His pamphlet 'Black Box' was published in February 2018 by Speculative Books. Follow him on Twitter @DavidRossLinkla