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in
collection Velázquez’s Riddle, 2011, Calder Wood Press;
published
in anthology, Women’s
Work, 2008,
Seren,
ISBN 978-1-85411-431-0
Velázquez on Picasso’s Pigeons
That man, that manic
clown, he’s painting pigeons!
He
excuses himself, to be sure, with the claim
it’s
the view from my windows. ¡Ojalá fuera!
If
only it were – it’s a view calls to mind
my
native Sevilla, or the coastline at Cádiz,
expanses
of water and waving pine trees,
birds
on the balcony, a fresh summer breeze
instead
of this arid Castilian plain,
pine-cloaked
Guadarrama range sawing the sky,
league
after league of boulders and rock
weighing
us down, we arse-lickers at court.
If
there were a pigeon-loft around my windows,
one
of two things: her highness would be cooing,
handling
their feathers, laughing, smiling, playing
like
a child in any village watching living creatures grow;
or,
more sinister, more likely, the courtiers
would
pluck them from their nesting boxes, eat them,
that
is, if his good majesty had not had them first.
I
fear a game bird’s life at Philip’s court is short.
Eat
or be eaten, crawl and curry favour. Simple rules
to
keep oneself alive in a world of fools.
Lyn Moir
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