Throwback Thursday: Three by Joan Leotta

Ekphrastic poetry is something I've been doing for a long long time--much before I knew there was a term for  it. As a child, I used to imagine myself entering paintings and having adventures there--the book  The Counterpane Fairy by Katherine Pyle (A boy "travels" into quilt squares and has adventures) was an influence. My aunt was an artist and the Carnegie Museum awas free to enter--and I went often.. 

My first awareness of writing ekphrastic work came with the website Visual Verse where writers were challenged to prepare a piece within one hour. I was one of their most frequent contributors, and was asked to write a couple for them before they closed up shop a few years ago! When I found The Ekphrastic Review, Lorette, I knew your gentle way of working with writers, made it a place I wanted to be.published.

Each time my work appears in TER, I am so excited! And when it appears in a cohort with others as in the bi-weekly challenges, or contests, I am simply amazed by the variety of ways people respond to the art--it is enlightening and exciting to read them all!

One of my favourite stories to tell as a performer is one in which the artist paints pictures people can enter! I've never quite given up on that idea it seems.

Here are three of my personal favourites from my ekphrastic poems on this site.

Joan Leotta

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Addressing the Lady, Wearing a Green Kimono as She Sits on the Blue Chaise

https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-review/nine-lives-marathon-poetry-responses

"The kimono is so like things she wore--
'Redheads look good in green,' she would often say."

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Magritte’s Apple Explains It All

https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-review/magrittes-apple-explains-it-all-by-joan-leotta

​"Dreams, those moments when the conscious mind relaxes
when life’s everyday reality joins with matter deep inside..."

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The Golden Day

https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-review/the-golden-day-by-joan-leotta

"My friend, on seeing my photo 
of dawn’s bright gold spilling into our pond..."

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Wee Joan.