Regarding the Portrait of Antonietta Gonzalez, by Jane Blanchard

Portrait of Antonietta Gonzalez, by Lavinia Fontana (Italy) 1595

Regarding the Portrait of Antonietta Gonzalez
 
​The little girl, since she must pose, looks straight
at her beholder—first the woman who
dares paint, then anyone who might equate
a syndrome with a character. A slew
of such wrong-headed theories ran throughout
each court she came to—by another’s power--
to be gawked at, examined, talked about
as if a beast. No longer would she cower
before such brutes. Instead she holds a page--
unfolded—telling how her father had
been found, shown, shared; herself as well. The age
was mad to see a hairy creature clad
in rich brocade, the offspring of a wild
man (mother not worth mentioning). Some child!

Jane Blanchard

This sonnet first appeared in The French Literary Review.

This sonnet, first published in The French Literary Review, is the work of Jane Blanchard, who lives and writes in Georgia (USA).  Jane’s fourth collection with Kelsay Books is In or Out of Season (2020).