THE SOLACE OF FOOD, BEAUTY, NATURE, AND ART

Open Window, Collioure
Henri Matisse

While the title of my blog, The Shape of Light, is primarily a reflection of my interest in photography, I'm also interested in sharing other kinds of light, including the enlightenment to be found in the words and ideas of good literature, particularly good poetry.  Indeed, as you can see from earlier postings, I'm usually inclined to pair one of my photographs with quotes or poems from writers I admire.  For better or worse, I find that words can amplify images, just as images can amplify words.

The image being used today, however, is obviously not one of mine.  It's an image of the Matisse painting, Open Window, Collioure, which was painted in 1905 and currently hangs in  the National Gallery of Art.  I was invited to take a new look at this painting when, this morning, I stumbled upon a wonderful poem by Ellen Bass. Titled "French Chocolates," the poem eschews the bromides that are offered by well-intentioned friends when we are facing difficulties, and reminds us that the simple pleasures of food, beauty, nature, and art will usually provide more solace than hackneyed expressions of sympathy or psychoanalysis. 

French Chocolates

by

Ellen Bass

                                If you have your health, you have everything

                                is something that's said to cheer you up

                                when you come home early and find your lover

                                arched over a stranger in a scarlet thong.

                                Or it could be you lose your job at Happy  Nails

                                because you can't stop smudging the stars

                                on those ten teeny American Flags.

                                I don't begrudge you your extravagant vitality.

                                May it blossom like a cherry tree.  May the petals

                                of your cardiovascular excellence

                                and the accordion polka of your lungs

                                sweeten the mornings of your loneliness.

                                But for the ill, for you with nerves that fire

                                like a rusted-out burner on an old barbecue,

                                with bones brittle as spun sugar,

                                with a migraine hammering like a blacksmith

                                in the flaming forge of your skull,

                                may you be spared from friends who say,

                                God doesn't give you more than you can handle

                                and ask what gifts being sick has brought you.

                                May they just keep their mouths shut

                                and give you French chocolates and daffodils

                                and maybe a small, original Matisse, say
                                Open Window, Collioure, so you can look out
                                at boats floating on dappled pink water.       

"French Chocolates" is from
Like a Beggar, by Ellen Bass