Words & Images - paintings by Lisa Hess Hesselgrave and the poems they inspired
Ives Gallery - New Haven Free Public Library
August 1 through September 6, 2016
On display is work by Lisa Hess Hesselgrave, and the poems her paintings inspired. Ekphrasis means description in Greek. An ekphrastic poem is a poem written about a work of art.
Poet Maureen E. Doallas began a series of poems based on some of my work on the T.S. Poetry Press, http://www.tweetspeakpoetry.com/?s=hess.
More recently, the Golden Thread Gallery in Hartford invited poets to respond to the art on display, which included the pastel, Archer.
Below are pieces that were shown at the Ives Gallery and some of the ekphrastic poems written for them.
Some of the original paintings are available for purchase, some are only available as signed prints.
Rocking Horse
All the things left undone
the horse unridden
the floor unswept
the book on the table
open and unread
and just barely seen
through barely sheer curtains
on the window
trees yet unbudded
and, beyond them, red ghosts
of tenements. Are they
unlived in, abandoned?
So much so for our lives:
so much work, so much play
so much time, we think,
all undone by other urgencies
some other matter pressing
some other stolen time
like death playing with our lives
leaving us to abandon
the mark we were just making
on the world
the mark as yet unmade.
On the other hand perhaps,
the waiting now unwritten
is waiting to be ridden
on that horse waiting
in a room for a child not yet born,
the cleaning still to happen,
the buds on trees about to form,
the homes through the window
at sunrise about to be restored.
Tom Nicotera
Closing In
The wild closes in
the moment the sun
idles in its profusion
of mauves and reds.
With the blush of air,
I harbor blue to slow
the progress of time
that thickens roots
and deepens the char
of lost afternoons.
I trip over the orange
that tricks the moon
to appear a too-soon
omen of blurred visions
to come, tongue lolling
in heat-fed sleep. Dark
carries its own night
dreams. How I see
the sea become a field
of frost-licked snow,
sky the arms holding it
back from my mouth
athirst in fear. I mean
to find my own way out.
Maureen E. Doallas
Cross-bow In Sepia
She dreamed of pulling back, taut and tight
Left eye closed
To enhance the vision of the right
Squarely hitting her target
After days and weeks of practice
Under the cloak of night
Movement by day
And dreams by night
Blurred in browns and creams
Pinks and tans of her sepia colored world
She never meant to harm
Her heart was simply
Set on love
As she awoke
To a slow brightening
Asleep no longer
drowning in her dreams
Color floods her world
Aware
Awake
Drowning out the shades of
Her chocolate colored
Dreams
Of love, of him
Her bow no longer needed
She lays it down
Her love
Returned
In shades of sepia
Elizabeth W. Marshall
Huntress
Alone in the wood,
She listens for life.
The only response
is her own heartbeat.
She is used to silence.
She could be one of the trees;
Their shadows are the same,
and all are as still
as life can be.
She contemplates the object in her hands.
Its pale curves catch the remaining light
as she bends it,
using disguised strength
to string it tightly.
The tension in her hands
serves as a snapping reminder
of how easily her tool
could be made a weapon.
Power in hand,
the huntress stalks the forest.
In the forest she is a being
as bright and cold as the moon
that will soon rise to meet her,
and hail her through the night.
She snaps the bowstring,
letting the vibrations disrupt the air around her.
Leaves rustle indignantly;
she acknowledges them,
and removes the string.
She does not need to be the hunter tonight.
At least,
alone in the wood,
she is able to choose.
Meagan Thomas
Child
A child is a mystery,
like the light of stars—
the dream
we try to capture, even as it seems
to pass like the quickening scent
of Spring blows by.
Strange flower budding in the dark,
sweet and bitter tear,
learning to hide, stem of wishes
waiting to come true.
We cannot save you
from this gravity,
from such wonder, laced with pain—child,
fire of promise, burning in the rain.
Richard Maxson
Just because
we all know her voice,
mother, daughter, sister, friend.
Some times it’s too far away to hear a scream,
or there isn’t one;
nevertheless, we shake
our heads at the news,
or someone ushers us
out of the room from the floor,
where we were playing
and fear rises from a memory—
a hand rescued from a hot stove
when we felt the touch of fear.
When the dress is too familiar,
and the hair resembles…
we turn the dead bolt twice
and pull the door against it after.
When the dress is small and blue,
the architecture of the houses too familiar,
we walk to switches in our halls,
we slice the darkness with an open door,
and let our hearts still for the small
breaths sleeping where the lights fall.
Richard Maxson
Apprentice
Every boy should know how
to do a veronica, fix one knee
in front of the other, and bend
the spine to sounds of Ole! Ole!,
sure two-handed maneuvering
of the makeshift cape bringing
fully imagined bull to its lancer.
A particular flick of the wrists
takes practice to pose, each pass
low to keep the beast’s head down.
Some days it’s science, some art,
bull and boy both brought to kneel.
Who protests the positioning too
soon for the kill is lost in the last
swirls of magenta. Beyond the ring
feet fly; a clean white handkerchief
waves and waves. A mother waits
to press cloth to son’s bleeding face.
Maureen E. Doallas