Frenemies, by Larry Kilman

Crucifix in Santa Maria Novella, by Filippo Brunelleschi (Republic of Florence) 1410. Sailko, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons.

Crucifix, by Donatello (Republic of Florence) 1408

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Frenemies
 
The appearance of a man of outstanding creative talent
is very often accompanied by that of another great artist
at the same time and in the same place so that the two
can inspire and emulate each other.
                                                            Giorgio Vasari
 
Florence, 1408-1415
 
Hard to imagine he was unaware of his talent,
a man who questioned everything, whose work was concentrated agony.
Sometimes he hated getting out of bed. Was it worthy
or was it lacking? Was he any good?
 
His friend Filippo had no such qualms, a polymath wearing his skill with ease.
He could manipulate a piece of twine into something whimsical,
his fingers moving unmindful at the table
as he talked with his friends drinking wine.
 
For the commission of Santa Croce, Donatello worked a wooden cross.
Every splinter, every shaving was a cause for doubt.
He paced the room, gulped water, returned to the crucifix,
stared at it, removed a small bit of wood.
Eventually, it neared completion, and as the figured emerged,
he allowed himself a rousing thought: the piece was pretty good.
 
“I’ve hit on something this time, as if my hands were driven,”
he told his friends in a café that evening.
They listened keenly as he rarely discussed his work.
The feeling he described was not unknown to them.
 
Filippo saw it first, and couldn’t hide his chagrin.
This figure of Christ, too raw-boned, too thick.
“I think it needs work,” he told his friend,
“think, in fact, you best start again.
It has the shape of a peasant, not the son of God.”
 
We can imagine how Donatello must have felt;
though his face, wooden as the cross,
showed no hint of disappointment,
no outward sign that anything was amiss.
We, he, everyone, struggles to contain the hurt.
 
His voice in check, a monotone, he said;
“If it was as easy to make something as it is to criticize,
my Christ would look to you like Christ.
Go get some wood and make one more to your liking.”
 
In the months that pass, Donatello berates himself, works on nothing,
questions his own judgment. 
His friends meet for drinks and talk of other things:
The progress of grants, good food, the women in the square.
 
In time, Filippo asks his friend to his home.
In the courtyard before the door, in good light,
hangs Filippo’s Christ.
Its design is perfection, its execution sublime.
It does what any bishop hopes it would: Uplifts.
 
Awestruck, Donatello looks,
marveling not at its beauty,
or even at Filippo’s ability.
He is thinking instead of all the work ahead of him.
 
Larry Kilman

Larry Kilman is a graduate of Syracuse University with a dual major in art history and magazine writing. He is a journalist and poet who has been lucky enough to live and work on four continents. His poems have been published or will be published in a wide variety of journals, including Epiphany, Mudfish 4, Brief Wilderness and 7th-Circle Pyrite. He lives in South Africa.