Poetry Rules

So yesterday evening I was sitting at my table, with a glass of wine and a pad when I started skimming through my Francesca Woodman books. I was captured by her Self-Deception series and the pen started flowing to the rhythm of her black and white pictures and her twisted body. There is a strength in her work that makes it appear almost as solid as a sculpture and yet wraithlike. There is a naked truth hidden in her works that needs to be deciphered. These shots were taken in a cellar, which make them even more intriguing to me. I keep wondering whether Bluebeard was her favorite fairy tale as a kid.

The naked truth is that I wish my poems could boast the same stark honesty of Francesca Woodman's photographs. There is so much power in them and the clear feeling that she is weaving a story in every single snapshot. Unhinged doors, thresholds leading to everywhere and to nowhere, tightrope walker kind of poses, apparent oddness winking at surrealness, scattered debris, cracked mirrors, objects mingling with bodies and her Self. Francesca--whether naked or not--leaves her mark, her trail of personality throughout the whole scene. All her shots are still yet vibrant means of self-assertion. And yes, she is becoming my disquieting Muse.