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| Burdock 70 x 50 x 1.8 cm - acrylic on canvas |
STEALING BEAUTY
We find
ourselves immersed
in a
Bertolucci movie in which
a gathering
of affluent bohemians
seem to be going
slightly out of their minds.
I don’t
know if it’s the weather.
Or if
there’s a philosophy behind it all.
But
something’s a little off.
A hot
summer day near Siena;
Liv Tyler baring
her breasts for the artist
who, it
will later become evident, is her father.
He works on
paper in a swirl of black crayon.
A little
girl is beating an olive tree
with a
stick, chanting, “take that and that and that…”
Two or
three other people
look as if
they might strip naked any
moment then
recite their favorite obsessions—
a light in
their eyes that shouldn’t be there—
on this
afternoon numinous with heat. Sweet n’ sour
tangle of
grasses and wild flowers. A whiff
of vineyards,
and pot smoke from the front porch.
In villages
on the Rhine as Carnival starts up
bands of women
roam the streets
with
scissors in their hands
hunting
down men whose
neck ties
they cut off. I had never thought
of neck
ties as beautiful before. I guess you
have to
lose something silk with stripes or paisley
with tiny
fleur-de-lis worked into the pattern
for such a
realization to hit you. These days
I keep the
survivors zipped up in an old gym bag.
Nice to
know they’re still there if I ever need them.
