Two Still Lifes, by Mark McDonnell

The Dream, by Henri Rousseau (France) 1910

​Two Still Lifes
(The year after his wife died)

1. The First Date

Low lighting is suggested by dabs of yellow
on two forks lying across a dark blue plate;
smears of cream and crumbs of dark chocolate.
A painting within a painting, half of a print visible:
Henri Rousseau’s Dream, jungly, a snake, sad-eyed lions,
a piper piping and, just in frame, two naked feet.
Olive-coloured napkins pick up the print’s palette; 
light, like egg-white, on two espresso cups; on the saucers
two sweet biscuits, still wrapped in hyper-real cellophane.
The table for two is seen behind a curtain in gilt brocade,
drawn back as if to expose something clandestine.

2. The First Sex

Looking into a hotel room through the open bathroom door,
we see a third of a large bed, a glass of water on a side-table.
It is skilful how the painter catches, reflected in the water,
a hint of two bodies lying together in the unseen part of the bed.
A neutral wall, not much more than gessoed; in contrast
the rumpled white duvet is worked with thick brush strokes 
and heavy impasto, some unexpected colour added: blues,
a ruckle of waves, we are unsteady on shore after a sea-journey; 
occasional passages of spring-leaf green amongst the folds; 
purple shadows beneath the white ridges of bedding, 
like blood pooling in the limbs of the recently dead.

Mark McDonnell  
​
Mark worked in industry in the UK, Spain and the US before a second career in psychotherapy.  He spends his time nowadays writing, singing and teaching English to refugees. His work has been published  in English, Irish and Spanish journals. He is working on two pamphlets.