 Figures in a Landscape, by Bertram Brooker (Canada) 1931 The Final Exchange for Shaohua Yan after Figures in a Landscape by Bertram Brooker (Canada), 1931 C.E. Our brief final exchange, after we had been naked together for the last time— before we parted our ways for good: YOU: … But you ought to know: whilst you were with me, you were always able to be yourself. … I know you like I know the back of my hand! … But perhaps, until you actually faced the music of the aphorism, the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, you would never mature up (to life). … Forget me not! I: … This is the Final Resort: moving away (from everything). … Nothing else makes any sense to my emotional/rational mind anymore! Postscriptum … And when I was eventually betrayed by my so-called love of pragmatism & empiricism, I had no face left to face you. … I confess: you knew me like you knew the back of your hand, indeed! … And NO, I could never forget you—though I tried all manner of recipes to cook all manner of excuses. Saad Ali Saad Ali (b. 1980 C.E. in Okara, Pakistan) has been brought up in the UK and Pakistan. He holds a BSc and an MSc in Management from the University of Leicester, UK. He is an existential philosopher-poet. Ali has authored four books of poetry i.e. Ephemeral Echoes (AuthorHouse, 2018), Metamorphoses: Poetic Discourses (AuthorHouse, 2019), Ekphrases: Book One (AuthorHouse, 2020), and Prose Poems: Βιβλίο Άλφα (AuthorHouse, 2020). He is a regular contributor to The Ekphrastic Review. By profession, he is a Lecturer, Consultant and Trainer/Mentor. Some of his influences include: Vyasa, Homer, Ovid, Attar, Rumi, Nietzsche, and Tagore. He is fond of the Persian, Chinese and Greek cuisines. He likes learning different languages, travelling by train, and exploring cities on foot. To learn more about his work, please visit www.saadalipoetry.com. ** Figures In A Landscape "The man's body is sacred and the woman's body is sacred. No matter who it is, it is sacred..." Walt Whitman (The Body Electric) "With so much before me...mountains and lakes, how could I not Be only myself, the dream of flesh, from moment to moment?" Mark Strand When we gathered to say our last goodbyes, Mon Cher Ami, I was surprised when your daughter said I didn't know Daddy painted so many nudes. Your art was a secret, or perhaps I didn't know you well enough to imagine you in the Texas countryside, in a cabin you'd built yourself, with a woman peeling off her clothes -- that identity -- and assuming an evocative position close enough to reveal her details, her flaws, the way her embrace had inspired you to translate her body with the language of brush strokes... * Beside a lake in Manitoba, Bertram Brooker's figures are anonymous, and naked their faces hidden, the woman's hair falling forward, resembling the long branches of a willow as she bends beside the shapely backside of her partner, his body like a boy's in its beauty, unwrinkled by time, his head turned so he can watch her movements, her fingers reaching down to trace the pattern of his open lips as if she can catch sound, and hold it in her hand, the landscape filled with silence & a kind of music -- nature's fugue -- (point and counter-point) soothing 2 figures suspended between the finite world and the infinite, their dreams, abstract & representational fused in the artist's view by the sensual message of the girl's hair, drying after a swim; and the boy's body, articulated and repeated in the curved immobility of the mountains on the other side of the lake. Beneath a muted blue sky, an unexpected wind whispers an earthly interpretation of Eden: in the beginning, there was a tree, a Lone Tree -- and then I found you before the light exploded in abstract expressionism, and we were more than 2 figures, our images undressed in the landscape before another night came down and notes for summer music were written in luminous shorthand Laurie Newendorp Laurie Newendorp contributes, regularly, to the Ekphrastic Challenges. Her book, When Dreams Were Poems, 2020, explores the relationship of poets to art. One of the book's ekphrastic poems won second place in the Houston Poetry Fest, 2018, and another was nominated for Best of The Net, 2020. ** Figures in a Landscape A geography of bodies stretch across the canvas White as snow-covered hills, or the Sheer carbonate structures of the Dolomites. Ski-slope hips--wind-whipped, dimpled escarpments-- Dip into the spinal ridge and fall To the blanket below, gathered in snow drift folds, The other body rises, peaking, tree-like. A knobby white birch, or pale banyan, her Hair like aerial roots seeking richer soils. Nature is laid bare in them. Naked. Open to the light. So true to life It could not be shown as art. The landscape is artifice by comparison, A flat blue water plane, uncertain river or lake, The mammilated, over-round horizon. Brooker embarrasses the Victorian in us, Our shameful curators’ tastes, The nudes held from exhibition, Checked by the prudes, who exposed themselves As the gatekeepers that they are. Ian Evans Ian Evans is an emerging writer and middle school teacher with his B.A. in English and an Ed.M. in Secondary English Education. He is co-author of The Mechanic, a graphic poem, and his poetry has appeared previously in The Ekphrastic Review. He lives in Highland Park, New Jersey, with his wife, who is also a writer and teacher. ** Honesty More honest, two could seldom get than, fully naked, as eyes met for revelation once begun that nevermore could be undone in which the sense of absent space became the landscape of embrace in moonlit window aptly framed and seen as art to be acclaimed at moment they apart awoke to freedom relished as they spoke of all that it had meant to be in eyes they could but hope would see the soul each also sought to bare. but half its worth before its dare. Portly Bard Portly Bard: Old man. Ekphrastic fan. Prefers to craft with sole intent of verse becoming complement... ...and by such homage being lent... ideally also compliment. ** Figures in a Landscape Beyond the crest of hip and buttock and the smooth swell of shoulder and breast, hill and mountain sweep down to the lake in misty twilight hues of greys and blues. While his dawn sleep is dark and deep, her dreams were broken by first light a welcome respite from the wreck of night. Kim M. Russell Kim M. Russell has been writing poetry since she was a schoolgirl but only began submitting to competitions and anthologies when she retired from teaching in 2014. Her poems have been published on-line by Visual Verse, among others, and in print: Afflatus Magazine, River Writes (Bure Navigation Conservation Trust), Anthology of Aunts and Second Place Rosette (Emma Press), Peeking Cat Anthologies 2017 and 2018, and Field Work (UEA Publishing Project with Kunsthalle Cromer). She lives in the UK, in East Anglia between the North Sea coast and the Norfolk Broads, with her husband and two cats. ** Bareness What will I remember of you When I grow old? Will I think about our time apart, Our time as friends, as lovers? Will I recall certain sensations: Fear, heartbreak — all that comes With young love? I’ll remember vulnerability –– The way first kisses and first fights Took me back ten years, to when I first flew a kite. I’ll remember how you laid me bare, Peeled back layers in a way that Nobody had ever done before Nor could ever do again. I’ll remember how you stretched me thin, Brought everything out of me (the butterflies, The cries, the feeling of your eyes on mine For the very first time). I’ll remember that you brought me closer to The sky, put my thighs on your shoulders, Picked me up –– the sunlight shone through me. Niko Malouf Niko Malouf: "As a teenager living in Los Angeles, I enjoy writing about the things that surround me, stimulate me, the events of my adolescence as well as the happenings of the world. I hope to share my experiences and perspective with others and inspire them to do the same." ** Tilting I like those words that tilt their emphasis from syllable to syllable, depending on what part of speech they’re playing. An adjective, for example: invalid. Dismissing something as false, irrational et cetera, a curt judge of a word, rolling back its weight from second place to first, making itself a noun. Heteronyms are good like that, you say. Your gaze is fixed on this chronic landscape, green with double meaning – this late nonplus of curve and counter-curve. A hip, an elbow, a white stretch of skin: our bodies mean exactly what they mean. Fatigue hangs like fate while the glossy lake swims past the nakedness of our defeat. It comes as some relief to be out here with you, amid the certainties of love and loss. The hills mimic (or mock?) our torsos. Or perhaps they think that we mock them, uselessly flung down here as we are, you beside me, one more time, as the sun dips in search of its usual resting place . . . Michael Caines Michael Caines was longlisted for this year's National Poetry Society Competition. ** Swan Maidens Afterwards, a stillness; they are arched, poised, aching for the possibility of more. Right now, they choose to pause for breath beneath their familiar oak; stare at light shafting glacial water; watch faint sunrays kiss curves of hills on the far shore; sense the ripple of sheet around each form. This dawn, they are featherless; the last wisps, from neck, breast, back, plucked by the other last night. Now, as in old tales, they are naked; queer bodies in true wilderness. Here they can be; remote from crowds and comment; hot blooded birds, rocking to the water’s cool lap. One day soon, thousands of downy feathers will sprout, uncurl, stretch before the long lift skywards; mute swans flying, back to the strong beats of bright city lives with men. Once there, they will wait: apart but still together. Dorothy Burrows Based in the United Kingdom, Dorothy Burrows enjoys writing flash fiction, short plays and poetry. This year her poems have been published on various webzines including Words for the Wild, Another North, The Ekphrastic Review and The Poetry Pea. ** Figures in a Landscape Gently rounded mountains and soft valleys. Undulating sensualness. Why did I always draw women, they asked? Because they have the lines that make me want to take my pencil or brush and… and then I just used my thumb to show them. Words failed me. What did you mean by that, they asked. And I remained shtum. If I had been able to explain, I wouldn’t have painted it. Women’s skin, women’s roundness, women’s edges, women’s joy in each other’s beauty, women’s desires, women’s love, women’s friendship. Eternal. Coveted. Feared. Persecuted. Let me watch. We are watching. Voyeurs of no-colour colours, strength, drama and tenderness. Figures in a landscape. If he had been able to tell us, he wouldn’t have painted it. There are as many new stories as there are watchers. There are as many interpretations as there are readers. We’ll all make our own second moment of creation. I can almost touch, reach into the painting and let my hand tenderly caress that moment where the torso melts into the hip, deep valley of the eternally feminine. I can almost reach in and stroke the crease where thigh joins buttocks. There aren’t words enough to tell you about where white meets grey meets flesh. Rose Mary Boehm Rose Mary Boehm is a German-born British national living and working in Lima, Peru. Her poetry has been published widely in mostly US poetry reviews (online and print). Her fourth poetry collection, THE RAIN GIRL, has been published by Chaffinch Press end August 2020. ** Choice This is a world of curves, of subtleties, of women. It is not reliably pleasant. Sometimes our hair hangs down. But the soft full strength-- folds of earth, folds of cloth, of flesh, folds at the centre of mind and heart-- who would choose to be elsewhere or other than this? Shirley Glubka Shirley Glubka is a retired psychotherapist, poet, essayist, and novelist. Her most recent chapbook is Reflections Caught Leaping: poetry and related prose. Her latest novel: The Bright Logic of Wilma Schuh. Shirley lives in Prospect, Maine with her spouse, Virginia Holmes. Website: http://shirleyglubka.weebly.com ** Remember When morning crowned belly swollen full of her own sex rising from ocean each day a virgin waiting for love we lay on dune our bodies tuned to the lyric of waves the rise and fall of crescendo drowning afterwards I traced your landscape soft strands seaweed hair draped on breast nestled in on folds of skin fingers trailed curves of spine an exotic shell unsure where spirals open or close anticipation mounting remember the man crafting sculpted sand? hands of a God creating something from nothing grain upon grain until we emerged immortal as if carved in stone day’s end we watched dusk wash her palette in ocean salt while lovers like driftwood coasted away arguments folded for later we waited for tide to begin his unkind erosion inevitable ruin his tongue lapping our sin Kate Young Kate Young lives in Kent with her husband and has been passionate about poetry and literature since childhood. Over the last few years she has returned to writing and has had success with poems published in webzines in Britain and internationally. She is a regular reader of The Ekphrastic Review and her work has appeared in response to some of the challenges. Kate is now busy editing her work and setting up her website. Find her on Twitter @Kateyoung12poet. ** What Will the Children Think? “Although Booker’s Figures in a Landscape, 1931, was accepted for a 1931 exhibition of the Ontario Society of Artists (OSA) at the Art Gallery of Toronto (now the Art Gallery of Ontario), it was not hung because it was felt it might negatively affect the sensibilities of children.” James King We refuse to display this painting of bare lines and elegant curves, of stark white flesh and warm tones, crowning the creases, of a stark white bedspread. What will the children think? We do know that nudity, is ubiquitous, filling the blank spaces of life- in restrooms, in bedrooms, in childbirth in operation theatres, in death. But, what will the children think? We revere Michelangelo and Donatello for their David, Rodin, for his thinker, Boticelli for Birth of Venus and Goya for La Maja desnuda and the endless line of sculptors and painters who have been there, done that. But today, what will the children think? We do see the two bodies, natural, real, foregrounding a beautiful landscape. We do remember Nude in a Landscape that hung aslant in all its glory on these pastel walls not long ago. But today, what will the children think? We do know that art is an endeavor to acknowledge the beauty of human body - a temple of new ideas, of fresh thoughts, of sacredness, an altar of offering to God, a means to find answers to life’s questions. But, what will the children think? What will the children think? No, we cannot corrupt their morals, their malleable minds. No, we cannot, we cannot. We refuse to display this painting. Preeth Ganapathy Preeth Ganapathy is a software engineer turned civil servant. She lives in Bangalore, India. Writing has been her passion since childhood. Her works have appeared before in a number of online magazines including The Ekphrastic Review, Snakeskin Poetry Webzine, Voices on the Wind Poetry Journal and are upcoming in Mothers Always Write and Willawaw Journal. She is also the winner of Wilda Morris’s July 2020 Poetry Challenge. ** Statues The statues have come to life – their marbled skin made flesh and glowing pink by a rush of blood and a flush of warmth from the icy lake. Fluid now and graced with softer curves – their plinths forgotten with their fear – they lounge at ease, adopt a pose that fits within their skin, adapt to one another, breathing in the scent of evening’s balm. Alive, at one, so still, so calm. Claudia Court Claudia Court has had work published in several magazines and anthologies, and has won a number of competitions. Her debut collection, How to Punctuate a Silence, was published in July by Dempsey and Windle. ** Figures in a Landscape Do not expect the moon’s blue glow to linger longer on the two women’s naked flesh, or that either one will move a finger, stir, turn, or offer yet another caress, and don’t think these lovers will hold their pose forever. One is on her side, at rest upon a luminous blanket -- tints of rose flecking the mounds of her shoulders, her rear, the creases of her legs; the other shows one small breast’s bewitching curves. She sits near a window while gleams soften on a lake walled by dark hills. The stars shall disappear, just like these figures in a dream’s landscape, dim, fleeting, gone as soon as you awake. Gregory E. Lucas Gregory E. Lucas writes fiction and poetry. His short stories and poems have appeared in many magazines such as The Horror Zine, Dark Dossier, Ekphrasis, Miller's Pond, and Blue Unicorn. Some of his poems have also appeared in past issues of The Ekphrastic Review. ** Lovers Afterwards we lay there naked looking through the window at the paired down blue landscape. We thought it was just as if waiting for Magritte to add a surreal touch. We thought if only a fine artist was standing behind us easel and paints at the ready. What a beautiful picture we would make lying there even without a surreal touch. Lynn White Lynn White lives in north Wales. Her work is influenced by issues of social justice and events, places and people she has known or imagined. She is especially interested in exploring the boundaries of dream, fantasy and reality. She was shortlisted in the Theatre Cloud 'War Poetry for Today' competition and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and a Rhysling Award. Her poetry has appeared in many publications including: Apogee, Firewords, Vagabond Press, Light Journal and So It Goes Journal. Find Lynn at: lynnwhitepoetry.blogspot.com and facebook.com/Lynn-White-Poetry-1603675983213077/ ** Explorers I was a traveler in a place without borders where we were the only citizens exploring with care each hidden crevice, we climbed cliffs and crags, ascended to the apex, ecstatic, enraptured, dizzy and delirious. Now, gone the roses, the softly mounded hills--my gnarled fingers reach out to a void, a landscape erased by time. You were my true north, and we created a textured map, each touch imprinted in my mind. But the map is fading, and I am lost. Merril D. Smith Merril D. Smith is a historian and poet. Her poetry and stories have appeared recently in Vita Brevis, Streetlight Press, Ghost City, Twist in Time, Mojave Heart Review, Wellington Street Review, Blackbough Poetry, and Nightingale and Sparrow. ** Just Off The Sea-To-Sky Highway At Lions Bay BC We did not close the curtains yet we did not close our minds woken by first light sun stuttering over Gambier, the island shimmering on Howe Sound. With silence of late fall nobody jogging through Douglas fir no orange on Maple, the leaves no bears no skunks no kayaks off Lions Bay. We spooned tight, as one pheromones screaming assault droplets of guilt on our horizon beyond woodland and rippling waters deep blues, the pain. Behind us Two Sisters behind us September/October ahead Porteau Cove, sandy beach on the periphery of our liaison shipwrecked by Howe Sound. Far too anxious for breakfast too early for TransLink two six two, the bus route West Vancouver due south for Horseshoe Bay, your ferry. Soon to be separated, gone miss the silk of your pristine skin miss moments we shared miss tension and self-incrimination woken by first light for there can be no other. I ingest your body parfum digest your body language resist your fingers on my lips, the touch forbidden fruit is a dark hollow above pristine shores of Lions Bay. Alun Robert Alun Robert is a prolific creator of lyrical verse. Of late, he has achieved success in poetry competitions and featured in international literary magazines, anthologies and on the web. He particularly enjoys ekphrastic challenges. In 2019, he was a Featured Writer of the Federation of Writers Scotland. ** Serenity Hills unfold a backdrop as sensuous as the flesh reclining, undulating in front of them. Two women fallen under the spell of the river’s current, the last light of a darkening sky, as though they had laid down to love, then rest in its sensual presence. Their lithe bodies rosy, slants and slopes painted with a whisper of blue shadow, the Greek perfection of the breast. The curtain is pulled back on the edge of spiritual and material-- complementary in this moment of pure serenity. Forget that the public cried out against these figures, removed them. Admiring beauty in nature and countryside, they turned prudish faced with nude figures in a landscape. Sandi Stromberg Sandi Stromberg was a prize-winning magazine feature writer and editor in another life. Today, art and poetry combine to brighten her days during the pandemic. Her most recent work has been published in The Ekphrastic Review, Still the Waves Beat, Snapdragon: A Journal of Art and Healing (“Silence as Matter”), and Waco WordFest Fire Anthology (“Mischief on Jamaica Beach”). **
Lorette C. Luzajic Lorette C. Luzajic's creative writing has been published in several hundred literary and arts journals in print and online, and in about a dozen anthologies. She has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize and for Best of the Net, with one making it to the finalists. She is the author of numerous books, including five collections of poetry. Pretty Time Machine: ekphrastic prose poems is the latest. Her poetry has been translated into Urdu. Lorette is the founder and editor of The Ekphrastic Review. She is also an award-winning mixed-media artist. Visit her at www.mixedupmedia.ca.
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March 2023
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