To rescue Kahlo from the clutches of the corporate art market, we need to acknowledge the overt and covert political dimensions of the work, demands GAVIN O’TOOLE
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by Yvonne Reddick
If you can see past the relentless commodification you will be rewarded by enormously powerful work, suggests JENNY MITCHELL
CHRIS SEARLE revels in the one-off collaboration between an American polymath and a British Muslim, and detects the presence of their revolutionary forebear
GORDON PARSONS revels in an ebullient production of Shakespeare’s magical comedy
BRENT CUTLER welcomes a thoughtful analysis of the Erdogan regime, viewed through the evolving history of a neighbourhood in Istanbul
GORDON PARSONS regrets the price, but is dazzled by an outstandingly ambitious study of the way art restoration in particular, and culture in general was weaponised by the Nazis
I wanted to write Speak, but it wrote Spark.
Loaded with cartridges, it rested on the desk.
No one dropped it or chewed the tip
but its tactics grew underhand. I tried to write
Je suis Européenne. It spoke for itself. Je suis Iranienne.
I unscrewed nib from body. Inside, a pipeline of what
stirred in the Cretaceous, freighted and volatile. Oceans,
continents shifted. The drillbit woke it to burn, liquid
to solid carbon-black, changing state back to ink.
Indelible blots: my hands smudged shirts, doors, tables.
Each murky fingermark printed a tiny globe,
fuel-lines from Persian Gulf to Gulf of Mexico.
A newspaper flapped to the doormat: slicked gull’s
wings. EVERYTHING WRITTEN IN FIRE AND OIL.
I tried to sketch a cottage, so the gift drew smoking
rubble. A blazing refinery spoke to my line
Thank you for this beautiful Waterman pen.
Yvonne Reddick is an award-winning writer, editor and ecopoetry scholar. This poem is taken from her first full collection, Burning Season (Bloodaxe Books 2023).
Poetry submissions to thursdaypoems@gmail.com.
