Now he burns blue, spits at the scythe and hood,
paints cruel age, the impotence —
phallic pipes, the artist’s severed hand,
fecund woman scorning the besotted old man.
Stained grey, splayed his fingers grip the brush,
jab at the muted palette — fanned strokes
swift and uncluttered, duplicity
discarded as his final years wrestle
across the voids. Simplicity
strips statements to black and white —
the female other sprawled, her open sex
staring. She//he. Icon draws his fright,
brush-strokes the model. Life pared
to the passion of art. Body/bar/chair.
Merle Nudelman is a lawyer, poet, editor and teacher. Her first collection, Borrowed Light (Guernica, 2003), won the 2004 Canadian Jewish Book Award for Poetry. True as Moonlight, which is her fourth poetry collection, will be released in 2014. Her other books are We, the Women and The He We Knew, both published by Guernica in 2006 and 2010 respectively. She is poetry editor of the journal Parchment.
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