Pollock Woman
By the end of her life, she was making love to chairs,
she wore rooftop dresses.
She bought hair from strangers,
and ate lids of Tupperware.
In her youth she was a beauty,
but at fourteen she missed her period,
she called it a bloodless coup,
nobody overthrown but her.
Now her shadow has disowned her,
horrible syllables falter and fail,
she prays to the Virgin Mary with an axe,
yet the bruises on her back are sweet---
they dangle like broken branches
after the vicious, dreamy boy who raped her.
...is it just me or does John Latta
write a ponderous English?
posted by RC @ 12:32 AM
4 Comments:
Very powerful, the 'bloodless coup' stanza especially. I don't get the Pollock connection though, if indeed 'Pollock' refers to the man and not an area, something outwith my ken.
Thanks,Jim.Actually the Pollock connection is very bare,I was looking at a book of his paintings and tried to see the Woman character away from the canvas.
I thought this was a really neat poem, but the title threw me off as well. Both my grandmothers were Polish, so growing up I was a Pollack! How they hated pollack jokes ... (of course I told them all the time.)
Sigh.
Whachagonnado.
Thanks for the comments,Matt.Yes,the poem is about a series of paintings by Jackson Pollock who was associated with the New York School of Poets.
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