Untitled, by Lindsey Thäden

Self-Portrait on the Borderline Between Mexico and the United States, by Frida Kahlo (Mexico), 1932.

Untitled

Frida Kahlo is known for her self-portraits, and here she holds a Mexican flag made of papel picado [cut paper] looking south on the U.S.-Mexican border. Kahlo was married for a time to Mexican muralist painter Diego Rivera, who was commissioned to paint extensive murals in cities across the U.S. Kahlo didn’t feel at home in the United States, and was upset by the industrialism she saw in cities such as Detroit and New York.

​
Buildings like esqueletos
block the Aztec sun—as I stand
over earth & wiring as roots.

Lindsey Thäden

Lindsey Thäden is the most recent winner of New York's 2016 #PoetweetNYC contest. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in the Philadelphia-based Apeiron Review, eleven40seven, New York Metro, Passages North and Vending Machine Press, which is e-published from Sydney, Australia.