Self Portrait

It’s another Poetry Friday, this week hosted by Matt Forrest Esenwine at Radio Rhythm and Rhyme. Thank you, Matt, for hosting!

I hope everyone in the poetry universe is healthy and well. I am supposed to attend a Highlights poetry workshop in a week, led by Gail Carson Levine. Only ten people have signed up and I suspect that it will not be cancelled, but who knows? I have been so looking forward to it. Fingers crossed. It’s an uncertain time, for sure.

Meanwhile I have a short post for this week. I’ve spent way too much time with the news, thinking about my sister in California and my son in New York City.

My oldest son, Philip, was supposed to be born on April 4th. But I never made it, and he was born early on April Fool’s Day, which he found to be a delightful birthday. Maybe that’s why he was blessed with a good sense of humor. Anyway, since it will be April soon, I will celebrate him by posting a self portrait he painted in fourth grade and a poem I wrote inspired by it. Of course, being Phil’s Mom I hardly look at the painting with objective eyes, but I’ve always loved this self portrait. It makes me smile.

Philip’s self portrait.

SELF PORTRAIT
 

 It’s a painting from school, 
 a picture of me
 displayed in our house
 so my family can see. 
 
 Not happy or sad,
 what does that boy think?
 He stares into space
 and never a blink!
 
 He used to be me,
 the boy I was then.
 Maybe it's time
 to paint me again. 

©Janice Scully 2020

To end, check out and enter the NPR ekphrastic challenge. Kwame Alexander has chosen two paintings. Choose one that speaks to you and write a short poem inspired by it. Your poem might win and your words just might be heard on NPR.

16 thoughts on “Self Portrait”

  1. I love this! Each day it’s time for a new self-portrait. 🙂 I am a huge fan of ekphrastic poetry, just not the word “ekphrastic.” 🙂 My ArtSpeak! blog project is now in its 6th year — art theme this year is “red.” I didn’t know about the NPR thing, so thank you!

    1. Thanks, Irene. The word “ekphrastic” puts me off, too. But paintings and sculptures are good prompts and I want to do more of it.

  5. Love it, Laura! Absolutely love it! Thanks also for the ekphrastic NPR link. I’ve tried a couple of ekphrastic poems and would like to try more, so… here is my opportunity! I have 2 sons working in NYC, so I share your feelings… Best to you…

  6. The intensity of that gaze! I would love to see his current self-portrait! Thanks for the NPR link!

  7. April Fool’s Day does seem like a fun day to have a birthday 🙂 Doing a parent-child ekphrastic exercise is a great idea! Love the comment from Laura PS.

  8. I like the art and poetry feeding off of one another too–and yes to a new self portrait! I heard that poetry challenge from Kwame Alexander also, thanks for the link! Hope your sons okay in NYC, my daughter’s out there now for two internships and we are trying to reel her back home.

  9. Wondering if you have shared this poem with your son. Or if he would consider doing another self portrait, painted or drawn. I teach sixth grade, and so many of them are painting and repainting and repainting this year…Growing up is exhausting work….

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