Golden Boy by Fern G. Z. Carr

Golden Boy by Charles Gardet, sculpture atop Manitoba Legislature, 1918.

Golden Boy

Bronze Adonis gilt in gold
balanced atop the dome
of the Legislative Building,
cradling a sheaf of wheat
and raising a torch

like a relay runner
poised to pass the baton;
you are toned, buff –
in the buff.

Naughty naked boy,
where is your
common sense –
facing northward
flaunting your manhood
and exposing your full
glory
to raw Winnipeg winters?

        
Fern G. Z. Carr

First published in Ekphrastia Gone Wild, edited by Rick Lupert.

FERN G. Z. CARR is a Director of Project Literacy, lawyer, teacher and past President of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. She is a Full Member of and former Poet-in-Residence for the League of Canadian Poets.  Carr composes and translates poetry in five languages while currently learning Mandarin Chinese.  A 2013 Pushcart Prize nominee, she has been published extensively world-wide from Finland to Mauritius. In addition to multiple prizes and awards, honours include being cited as a contributor to the Prakalpana Literary Movement in India; her poetry having been taught at West Virginia University and set to music by a Juno-nominated musician; an online feature in The Globe and Mail, Canada’s national newspaper; and her poem, “I Am”, chosen by the Parliamentary Poet Laureate as Poem of the Month for Canada.  Carr is thrilled to have one of her poems presently orbiting the planet Mars aboard NASA’S MAVEN spacecraft. www.ferngzcarr.com.