Ekphrasic Poetry - Girl with a Pearl Earring

A Girl with a Pearl Earring

Titles are always about a thing in a moment.
Like this one is about an earring on a girl
Whose head is tilted so that the space beneath

Her ear is in the penumbra of that moment.

In another moment, the sun’s angle,
Relative to the tall, narrow window, will shift
And flatter the elbow, or delicate curve
Of the derriere on its way to the knee.

She will have finished asking if you want tea,
Which is why her head turned toward you
(And us), for just that moment, and only
As a courtesy to the moment – and the light.

© 2014, Jeff Roberts

Digital Image by: Dorothee Golz (Vienna) http://www.dorothee-golz.com/

Winter Solstice - Saint Lucy

Saint Lucy

Lucy of light, patron of writers, what fun

To believe you removed your own eyes

To deprive a man of your beauty.

Today is the shortest day.

We don your white dress and red sash

And remember how

You lay upon a brothel floor

To be defiled by pagans

As a lesson to your virginity.

And when the pagans were sated

You lay upon a fire that did not burn

Until martyred by a sword.

Tonight, let your plated eyes

And wreath of candles

Light our dark and delicate dance.

© Jeff Roberts, 2013

Image:

Jeff Roberts, 1954-

Saint Lucy, 2013

Mixed media assemblage

9” x 9”

Poem: © Jeff Roberts, 2013

Jeff Roberts Reads His Poetry Sep 21, 2013

Jeff Roberts Reads His Poetry Sep 21, 2013 - Sponsored by Trails and Sails. From the studios of North Andover Community Access Media

Just Jeff's 3 Poems

Complete Show Hosted by Gayle Heney - 38 min.:

Museums

Museums

The New Yorker never mentions

The smell of linseed oil in the basement
Where my late father painted shadows
Out of synch with their suns.

His paintings hang in my living room

And lean against walls in the attic
Echoing di Chirico, and Hopper, and Wyeth
Like good shoes in marble caverns.

Nothing like, but not that different from

Ellsworth Kelly’s delicate plant drawings
With their fine, palsied lines
Hanging this summer in the Met.

Live Stream of Jeff Roberts on BNN TV at 6PM ET on Monday July 15th

I'll be Suzanne Schultz's guest on her show It's All About Art on Monday, July 15th, 2013. The show will stream from the Boston Neighborhood Network at 6-7 PM ET. You can watch by selecting the "Watch Now" link from the BNN home page (top right).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8OlRqI3JlY
Please join us as we discuss my art, art in general, and anything else that Suzanne wants to talk about.

About BNN: Boston Neighborhood Network Television is a nationally recognized, award-winning community media center and 501(c)(3) nonprofit which acts as a public forum for all Boston residents, nonprofit and community-based organizations and educational institutions providing them with affordable training and access to emerging media technologies.

About Suzanne Schultz: Suzanne is the founder of Canvas Fine Arts (http://www.canvasfinearts.com/) a full service artist management and representation company located in Boston. She places and promotes established and emerging artists in non-standard venues like hotel lobbies, high-end retail shops (Nieman Marcus, Thomas Moser), and in her own loft/salon/gallery. She also offers very informational and practical introduction to art marketing workshops with excellent food and personal attention.

Jeff Roberts

Original Art & Poetry

618 Chickering Road
North Andover, MA 01845

Mobile Phone: 978-257-0898

E-mail: opmjeff@gmail.com

Art Blog: www.artflit.blogspot.com

Poetry Blog: www.jeffrobertspoetry.blogspot.com

Etsy Shop: http://www.etsy.com/shop/opmjef

Goings On

Goings On

The New Yorker doesn’t mention the artist
I knew as my father. Neither his
Meticulously sculpted temple garden
Nor his basement studio, where he potted
Saplings and painted for the last fifty years.

This is the week to go. The studio
Has lost some of its oily smells. The garden
I’m sure, is wild and untended. Although
I haven’t returned since his stroke, since
The hospital vigil with our one-sided conversations.

Hundreds of stalks of bamboo arc
Slightly toward the window over the porch.
Maples and dogwoods meet reds and pinks
That only Albers would introduce, at first
Seemingly at odds, but soon perfect together.

Every winter Dad painted until dawn
In the basement, as cheap, hand-wired speakers
Pushed Dylan and Baez through the dust.

Like di Chirico, his disorienting perspective
Resulted in men who were taller than trees.

Nothing like Ellsworth Kelly’s checkerboards
And geometries of bright, primary colors.
Nothing like those delicate plant drawings
With their fine, slightly palsied lines
Hanging this summer in the Met.

Gafney Library Show - Rochester Times (NH), April 5, 2012

Poem Objects on disply at the Gafney Library in Sanbornville, NH through May 2nd, 2012.