#10 - Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019)

This poem was inspired by Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) directed and written by Céline Sciamma. This is the first one on my list that I’ve actually seen, and it was a joy to use the themes of the film as a jumping off point for a poem. However, in thinking about a lady under water, I was also drawing on a short film called The Deepest Dance by André Musgrove and Ariadna Hafez, and the last book I read, Private Rites by Julia Armfield. 

Content note: Poem contains references to drowning. 

#10 – Portrait of a Lady Under Water

The day is shaking loose around its joins: 

the storm is breaking, making for the shore.

As raindrops fall like fractious, freezing coins,

all warnings lost in tempest’s surge and soar. 

My footing slips, I stumble from the quay;

the ocean swells around me, like a spell.

My burning lungs a painful augury 

of life and death in perfect parallel.

The world a blue and bruising monochrome

submerged between the surface and the deep,

I feel at once tenacious and alone, 

I feel the overwhelming urge for sleep.

And, though the lights around are growing dim,

I gather all my courage, and I swim.

LM 

Image via Unsplash