April tenth The Bathers at Asnières by Georges Seurat TSL's Napowrimo Ekphrastic prompt given by
Feby Joseph
A Roseate Sonnet as a tribute to Georges Seurat, Impressionist painter who was accepted only after his death as a great painter and founder of the pointillist school of painting which has no followers after him as only he knew its intricacies properly.
In the distance the factory chimney belches smoke
But it has not yet encroached on this sylvan scene
Sufficiently to give us alarm and no hope
Nature is still ruling and serene.
He draws no faces but they say these are workers
What he gives us is painting where the shadows and light are luminous
A masterpiece of pointillism and balaye brushstrokes
A world full of colour and the concretization of silence and still(-life)ness
What did it cost you, Georges Seurat? How many versions
Did you have to paint before hitting on this final masterpiece that was rejected?
Reasons. Was it one of them, for your early death at 31,
Or must great art be always misunderstood before it is accepted and rewarded?
'Sunday at La Grand Jatte' and 'Bathers at Asnières' have I gazed and gazed on
Eye-drunk, at the Beauty of Art-Life, by you; perfect composition composed.
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