Undressing Beauty
(Inspired by H. Matisse’s “The Blue Nude” 1907.)
When Grace poses nude
glowing in her pink silence
she shapes her hair carefully
checks the edges of a mirror
for tresses at the temple,
arches of her tattooed brows.
She wants students to taste
an artful version of life, lest
they perceive through flesh
her tide of lost opportunity
with the black-dog burden
she’s chosen to breathe.
Always attentive to beauty
sometimes, her eyes well up
float off into a downward dog
meditates feelings
balled-up in mothering pangs
for the child she never had.
by John Di Leonardo
(Judge’s Choice, The Banister, Niagara
Poetry Anthology, Vol. 30, 2015.)
John’s Bio