Suite for Vincent, by Linda Holmes

Self Portrait as a Painter, by Vincent van Gogh (Netherlands) 1887-88

​I
You pulled me through
the crowd, Vincent,
your wild eyes.
Tugging at my soul
like the moon at tides.
The smell of paint on your hands.
The anguish of your linen 
shirt. Startling. Coarse.
We stare at each other. Breathing.
In bold brush strokes.
Unholy hues. The passion
of our faces. The secrets
of Paris, Arles, and
Saint-Rémy. The infinity.
Of infinitesimal 
splashes of truth. Of sun
and wheat in different
golds. Of gray-green skies.
Of deepness. Everywhere in us.

Undergrowth, by Vincent van Gogh (Netherlands) 1889

​II
Draw me into the forest.
Deep. Where trees 
and undergrowth capture me.
Like a madness. 
Where lavenders and grays
jump out of the bark. Gently.
Where greens
beckon with mysterious
mouths. Where we see
only a hint of a path. 
Only a whisper 
of beyond. And the calm.
The penetrating calm.
The unexpected light
we brush into the leaves
to save ourselves.

Fishing Boats on the Beach at Les Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, by Vincent van Gogh (Netherlands) 1888

III
Take me to the sea. In four boats
we float as one. Huddled. Brave.
Waiting on the beach.
Sand scrubbing our painted
bows. Waiting for fishermen
to fill us with life. 
For the steely blue water 
to lap at our sides like brushstrokes.
Like blessings that drip 
from chalices into the mouths
of peasants.

Quinces, Lemons, Pears, and Grapes, by Vincent van Gogh (Netherlands) 1887

​IV
Set me down. Like a bowl of quinces
and lemons, pears and grapes, we 
are of singular hue. And yet many
intensities. In our yellowness
we outlast the putrid smell
of rotting fruit in harvest fields.
Shine in the bowl
like perpetual sun.
Roll like the roundness
of the planet.

Wheatfield with a Reaper, by Vincent van Gogh (Netherlands) 1889

V
In the end, make me
the wheat. Boiling 
and churning. You and I,
we feel, we live. We swallow
the reaper whole. In gulps
of amber, waves of truth.

​Linda Holmes
 
Linda Holmes has been writing poetry for years, but is new to the publication arena. Her poetry has been accepted at the Monterey Poetry Review, Spank the Carp, and The Avocet, and she has won several first place and other awards in the Tennessee Mountain Writers annual poetry contests. She is also the author of a non-fiction book about the experiences of an ancestor who fought and died in the Civil War. The book, If I Am So Lucky: A Portrait of a Man in Perilous Times, 1862-1865, was published by Heritage Books, Inc. in 2023.