Barbara Graff

January 30, 2018

“Here, She Said” by Chris RansickPosted by

Ekphrastic Challenge, December 2017: Editor’s Choice

 

Cinderella Doesn’t Live Here Anymore by Barbara Graff

Image: “Cinderella Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” by Barbara Graff. “Here, She Said” was written by Chris Ransick for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, December 2017, and selected as the Editor’s Choice.

[download: PDF / JPG]

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Chris Ransick

HERE, SHE SAID

It’s not what the light
lets you see, she said, it’s

this, and she pulled my face
underwater with a kiss.

Like amateurs, we covered
ourselves with earth, came up

the hill phosphorescent, as if
we’d hibernated, forgotten

our names. At the top
again we remembered them

and forgot only her shoes,
hallelujah may they glow

there forever above the pressed
turf, the illuminated trace

of pleasure turned to halo
round an embarrassed moon.

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
December 2017, Editor’s Choice

[download audio]

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Comment from the editor, Timothy Green: “It might have been the leading nature of the painting’s title, but most of the poems this month stuck to the fairy tale and extended the Cinderella story beyond ‘happy ever after.’ Chris Ransick, though, brought the image back down to earth, which also gave it a new emotional life. What really won me over, though, was the ‘hallelujah’ line, which appears unexpectedly with a feeling of genuine passion.”

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January 25, 2018

“Cinderella Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” by Devon BalwitPosted by

Ekphrastic Challenge, December 2017: Artist’s Choice

 

Cinderella Doesn’t Live Here Anymore by Barbara Graff

Image: “Cinderella Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” by Barbara Graff. “Cinderella Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” was written by Devon Balwit for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, December 2017, and selected as the Artist’s Choice.

[download: PDF / JPG]

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Devon Balwit

CINDERELLA DOESN’T LIVE HERE ANYMORE

Her princely marriage blighted mom. It wasn’t
what she thought, just different walls. She found
herself drawn to windows, parapets, the round
moon-face pulling her, asking why she hadn’t
left yet. So when we awoke to find her gone,
we weren’t surprised—although to father’s questions
we played dumb. We let him search, pursue notions
of re-wooing. We kids found traces on the lawn,
bare footprints in the dew, swatches of mistletoe
twining, bags of simples, bird skeletons hung
from lintels. Mother was about, still among
us—just changed. No scullion, no Highness, no
one but her deepest self, luminescent and wise.
We learned new ways to see her, not just our eyes.

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
December 2017, Artist’s Choice

[download audio]

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Comment from the artist, Barbara Graff: “Of all of the wonderful poems I read, I was drawn to Devon Balwit’s ‘Cinderella Doesn’t Live Here Anymore.’ This poem with its lovely imagery, gently touches the soul of what I tried to bring forth in the painting.”

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