Poetry Review Special Feature: "Prado" by David Murphy

Songs of Eretz Poetry Review is pleased to present "Prado," a previously unpublished poem by David Murphy.  During the past four years, Mr. Murphy's work has been widely published in various magazines and anthologies in Ireland and elsewhere, including:  The Poetry Bus, Stony Thursday Book, Revival, The Burning Bush, Cyphers, and The Shop.  Mr. Murphy is also a short story writer and novelist and has a book of non-fiction forthcoming from Dublin’s Liffey Press later in 2014.  Visit his poetry webpage at http://www.davidmurph.wordpress.com/poetry/.

Saturn Devouring His Son

Prado
David Murphy

When Goya painted

Saturn Devouring His Son

did he draw the blinds

in case panic-mongers

looked in the window?

Did he work from imagination

or use live models?

Blunt instruments – brushes –

kept him awake at night

along with deafness and demons.

Perhaps he worked

with child-like clarity.

Or with the single-minded

stare of a predator honing in.

Perception blank

of guilt and conscience.

Canvas engulfed in

blood-red dark of Saturn.

Editor's Note:  Ekphrastic poetry is much in vogue these days.  Most describe the painting itself.  Mr. Murphy's approach is refreshing, coming from the perspective of the painter in the process of creating a disturbing work of art.