ENGL202 Blog 1 – Creative: “Dance at le Moulin de la Galette” by Pierre-Auguste Renoir (Ekphrastic Poem)
4/ An ekphrastic poem is a poem that vividly describes a painting, such as X.J. Kennedy’s poem “Nude Descending a Staircase”. Try to write your own ekphrastic poem with reference to any one of the paintings shown to you during lectures in the first two weeks. Include an image of the painting in your blog.
The Man from Montmartre
Lily-pad lads and rosewater-coloured ladies.
Lips shifting around the velveteen tongue of the pipe.
Flesh of cream and peach and strawberry.
Timid embraces and demure smiles.
Temptation carved with arched brows and downcast eyes.
“Oh, what a lovely day for a dance!”
Touching her cheek and taking her hand,
wrapping lace gloves in your coat.
Henri stumbled to the table, stealing his chance;
mon bon monsieur’s fille…
the noise and the nerves as he spoke.
But I know you, with your back to our sights,
a weekend dappled with straw hats and Parisian sunlight.
They know so much when they are young and in love.
Leather shoes and parasols strewn upon cobblestone.
The billow of their skirts are the wings of a dove.
Chandeliers draped from the clouds,
and, as their gaze moved about
this bacchanalian shroud,
they glimpsed a man with his day in the crowd.
“What a day to put on display!
Oh, what a day too splendorous and gay.”
With your feet on the edge of the frame,
I’ll wish you had asked me to the dance.
Pummel me back a few decades with paint.
Your fractured shadow when I go home on the train;
you follow me still as I sit alone in the coach.
Your stillness shivers through the brush strokes.
Works Cited
| Renoir, Pierre Auguste. Le Bal du Moulin de la Galette. | |
| Rivière, Georges. Renoir et ses amis. 1921. |
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Mariama E. Biro Saibou 