Frida Kahlo

I envisaged her with gardenias in her hair
like those over there on the coffee table,
big splashes of white, and that scent.
‘I think of Billie Holliday,’
said the friend who gave them to me.
‘She always wore one in her hair.’

True, but I thought of Frida,
of whom it is not, apparently, true.
I search her self-portraits. She wore
yellow flowers – daisies
and perhaps chrysanthemums –
and red roses. Seldom white;
and when, I couldn’t tell what kind.

So I look instead at her face
knowing of course the tales,
her life of pain and turmoil
and passion, and most of all love.
I gaze at her expression,
uncompromising,
and the set of her head.
Such dignity! She never smiles.

5/11/08

Submitted 7 March 2014 for Poets United's Midweek Motif: Honouring women and women's achievements. (I guess this honours her obliquely, not spelling it right out.)

The Little Deer, by Frida Kahlo

April Challenge 8. Prompt: Write a poem inspired by one of two paintings. The one I chose can be seen here.

This forest is full of dead trees.
There's been a fire, you can see
by the blackened trunks.
Even the ground is charred.

The victim stands at bay.
Nine arrows shot hard
have driven into the soft flesh.
The deep wounds run with blood.

There is no escape – facing the hunters,
hemmed in by all that dead wood,
at back a whirlpooling ocean,
storm clouds, forks of lightning.

All that, I notice later. First
what arrests and fills my gaze
is her face: Frida's face, startling,
staring from the animal's head.

Her wide eyes and closed mouth
appear only mildly surprised,
slightly disdainful. She is mute
and will remain so. The little dear!

© Rosemary Nissen-Wade 2008
9/4/08