John Virtue’s London Paintings
Black ink. Shellac. Titanium white.
The amalgam of mistakes that might add up to something.
Walking through the painting, holding the sky; the light,
from six viewpoints, you’re still moving through them; might
see the river that isn’t like the river, or a bridge disappearing.
Black ink – Shellac – Titanium white
scratch windows into buildings, smear dark polluted light
across a day you will not have again. A day breathing,
walking, through the painting. Holding the sky, the light
back from his stone chest, Nelson pauses, catches sight
of a canvas being walked in from Covent Garden. He is waiting.
Black ink – Shellac – Titanium white
- stacked in cans of shadow and searing light.
In front of the stretched air is Virtue, his mind pacing;
walking through the painting, holding the sky, the light,
the rain flecked across a pond of pavement, the brilliant white
where sketchpad stopped being building. He is beginning.
Black ink – Shellac – Titanium white
walking through the painting – holding the sky – the light.
© Liz Bassett 2005
This is a poem I wrote for the Guardian poetry workshop in April, which is online at
http://books.guardian.co.uk/poetryworkshop/story/0,15167,1462545,00.html
Cambridge Wordfest and a fabulous evening of poetry reading at ‘Poets Centre Stage’ with
Nick Laird, Esther Morgan, and Jackie Kay. I’d not read Nick Laird’s poems before and really enjoyed hearing him read. Jackie Kay’s reading from her new collection Life Mask was beautiful. This woman has so much humour and integrity and her poems just get stronger and purer the more she writes. Read her.
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