stained canvi ; emulation + explication

Emulation of ‘The Dole of the King’s Daughter’ by Oscar Wilde

she let him in, allowing
him the privilege to tarnish her
eyes
ones that danced with sharp
whites and soft pastels

with every touch of his lips, red
smeared
across the canvas that is her soul
with every glance, every
graze of his hands against her
hips
the once blank canvas became
unrecognizable, with hues of
crimsons and deep indigoes being thrown

he covered every inch of her with
his colours,
masking her pastels until
his masterpiece was complete and he left
her mangled soul with a
devilish smirk of
corruption

Admittedly, I am not the biggest fan of Oscar Wilde. Perhaps it is his descriptors that end up being too much for my liking, however, when the group presenting Wilde for their seminar read out this poem, I think I had a slight change of heart. It turns out that I am not the biggest fan of his novel, but I do enjoy his poetry. Maybe it’s because I feel like I should be able to create my own world in my mind through a novel rather than having one crammed in that is the same as all others. I’m not entirely sure, and yet, this decided to flow from my pen when all I had wanted to do was take a nap.

One of the ideas that I do enjoy about ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ was corruption. I may curse how I feel like Dorian doesn’t have his own personality, but I do enjoy the outcome. I didn’t think that I enjoyed it, but now that I’m thinking about it, I do enjoy the corruption that one can experience from reading Oscar Wilde’s writing. One of the stories that always causes me physical pain to read are the ones of relationships that end up being lies. One is dared to ask them out. The other dated them out of pity. Hans from ‘Frozen’, that-
Those types of stories. I hate them, but I love to read them. It’s probably because I end up yelling both characters; for playing with someones heart, and for actually falling for it when it’s extremely obvious. By playing with this type of love story in this piece, along with the physical pain I was experiencing from painting on a canvas for the first time, I think that I was able to understand Oscar Wilde a bit more.

Now I might as well give him another chance.

c.m

Feature Image

‘cassette tapes’, retroapollo, Tumblr.com

 

One thought on “stained canvi ; emulation + explication

  1. Dear Chloe,
    I absolutely love this!! I’m so angry with myself for not coming onto your blog much sooner. I love the use of colours and the story that they tell on their own. You have such a beautiful voice that is super aesthetically pleasing to read. The theme of madness and corruption was so cleverly laced through the poem and, the story is so interesting!
    This isn’t really a critic more of just a suggestion but, I noticed how some words were on there own line like eyes, smeared, hips and corruption. I think it would be neat to play with the idea of having those singular lines say something when put all together (I hope that makes sense). But other than that, I adore this piece.
    I can’t wait to read more of your works now!!
    Sincerely,
    Paxton

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