Portrait of a woman
No Pre-Raphaelite ever painted me
No Madonna image reflected in my eyes
Or fallen woman begging for redemption,
I can only be found in the peaceful and tranquil setting
Of a Constable, whose rolling downs and trembling streams
Are the hallmarks of my anatomy,
Mother nature in repose perhaps?
Lowry captured my humble origins,
In his sad and lonesome matchstick figures
As they dash their weary way through street and town,
And, in my persecuted moments,
Turner captured me in his sunsets,
As the blood of the innocents splattered upon canvas.
Only Picasso knew me as I really am
As the dismembered being with the seeing eye,
Trying to make order out of chaos,
Yet, I am no masterpiece of classical imagery
Caught upon canvas,
I am the microscopic dot
Where pencil sketches begin,
To be moulded and shaped to life’s situations
By many gods, but dominated by none.
Then, when the great eraser of all time
Envelops me in her darkened mantle
And banishes me from being,
I will still remain, for those who have eyes to see,
The projected imagery of woman and the mother of time.
Sally James
(First ever published poem - published in Open University Anthology Openings 8 1990)
No Pre-Raphaelite ever painted me
No Madonna image reflected in my eyes
Or fallen woman begging for redemption,
I can only be found in the peaceful and tranquil setting
Of a Constable, whose rolling downs and trembling streams
Are the hallmarks of my anatomy,
Mother nature in repose perhaps?
Lowry captured my humble origins,
In his sad and lonesome matchstick figures
As they dash their weary way through street and town,
And, in my persecuted moments,
Turner captured me in his sunsets,
As the blood of the innocents splattered upon canvas.
Only Picasso knew me as I really am
As the dismembered being with the seeing eye,
Trying to make order out of chaos,
Yet, I am no masterpiece of classical imagery
Caught upon canvas,
I am the microscopic dot
Where pencil sketches begin,
To be moulded and shaped to life’s situations
By many gods, but dominated by none.
Then, when the great eraser of all time
Envelops me in her darkened mantle
And banishes me from being,
I will still remain, for those who have eyes to see,
The projected imagery of woman and the mother of time.
Sally James
(First ever published poem - published in Open University Anthology Openings 8 1990)
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