Picture this | 28 November 2013

In Competition 2825 you were invited to supply a poem for a well-known painting of your choice.

The poet and painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti was the inspiration behind this challenge. His sonnet ‘Found’ was written in 1881 as a companion to an unfinished oil painting of the same title on the theme of prostitution, which is now in the Delaware Museum.

Rossetti’s Pre-Raphaelite brethren featured strongly in the entry. Melanie Branton’s companion piece to ‘Ophelia’, a lament from a long-suffering Lizzie Siddal, made me smile.

Rob Stuart, Sylvia Fairley, Adrian Fry, Philip Wilson and Chris O’Carroll were also strong contenders but narrowly missed joining the prizewinners below, who take £25 each. The bonus fiver is Alan Millard’s.

Aye, clearly there’s a story here,
A story here,
Less tranquil than it might appear
Beneath that darkening sky:
The haywain stalls, the lad says naught
But points towards a lass distraught
Upon the bank — a moment fraught
With more than meets the eye.
 
Midstream the master, roughly clad,
Aye, roughly clad,
Stands staring at the pointing lad,
The horse waits, wain in tow;
A dog looks on. What came before,
Or afterwards might lie in store
For master, lad or lass is more
Than we shall ever know.
Alan Millard/Constable’s ‘The Haywain’
 
It’s raining men in bowler hats. Or is it?
They might be leaving, floating up, instead
Of dropping in politely for a visit.
They might be dangling from some unseen
thread.
The houses are stone-colour with red tiles,
Blank as a barracks, windows uniform.
The sky is faded blue. The painting style’s
So flat and automatic that the swarm
Of cloned and airborne puppets are just that,
 
Ciphers as inexpressive as goose eggs
Beneath the formal overcoat and hat,
Their motives blank as their black-trousered
legs.
Where are the fabled diamonds in all this?
Nowhere. The painter’s a blagueur futé,
Whose teasing title takes the holy piss
Out of mimesis. Way to go, René.