Ekphrasis

September 19, 2024

“Brushscape” by Samuel ErteltPosted by

Forage by Tammy Nara, mixed media watercolor of a thistle on an expressive blue and brownish pink background

Image: “Forage” by Tammy Nara. “Brushscape” was written by Samuel Ertelt for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, August 2024, and selected as the Artist’s Choice.

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Samuel Ertelt

BRUSHSCAPE

A man is stuck between
        two dreams in a patch
of thistle. Reaching
down, he picks a spiny brush
and dips it in the sky dark as indigo
before it bleeds. In front of himself,
he paints a lake         a memory
a kind of dusk lingering
       around the edges of
how reflections appear lavender
when still. The evening blots and runs.
He wipes the brush clean
       and turns, turns to steal
some white from the cloud
he’s imagined above his head. The man kneels
and paints         the ghost of a snowbank,
but the ghost keeps disappearing
       before he can make it solid
enough to melt, and he can only
imagine so many clouds.
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
August 2024, Artist’s Choice

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Comment from the artist, Tammy Nara: “I’m transported inside the painting as it is created. The artist creates his world. The evening blots and runs. (Yes, it does!) Stealing the white from a cloud. The ghost of a snowbank that disappears before he can make it solid. The other poems connected to the metaphor of the thistle, this poem is connected to the act of painting.”

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August 29, 2024

Haiku [call to prayer] by Almila DükelPosted by

Black and white photo of men and women crossing a temple courtyard, the woman in a burka, the men's faces blurred with dots

Image: “Lahore #44” by Faizan Adil. The haiku was written by Almila Dükel for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, July 2024, and selected as the Editor’s Choice.

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Almila Dükel

HAIKU

 
 
call to prayer
our faces hidden
from ourselves
 
 
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
July 2024, Editor’s Choice

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Comment from the editor, Timothy Green: “Moving beyond simple description, the best ekphrastic poems expand on their source material, often by imagining new narratives or pointing out small details that alter our perception of the piece. This haiku does something more unusual. In hyper-focusing its few words on the overall theme, the poem acts like a lens directing all of the scene’s energy onto a single point so intensely that it feels like we just might ignite.”

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August 27, 2024

“Song of a Masjid’s Floor” by Ammara YounasPosted by

Terry's Keys by Kim Beckham, photograph of keys hanging on a fence at a beach

Image: “Lahore #44” by Faizan Adil. “Song of a Masjid’s Floor” was written by Ammara Younas for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, July 2024, and selected as the Series Editor’s Choice.

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Ammara Younas

SONG OF A MASJID’S FLOOR

I sang
to atoms emptied in a mother’s feet
replicating the prosody of Adhān itself
the dust trembling like a lost child
burgeoning parable-like when her feet
shot up vertically         & as her face
descended to meet my face         my eyes
did not have the heart to meet hers
mine torrid & hers         torrential
 
I sang
to vowels         lost         into a father’s lips
thinking themselves         muhajir
who don’t belong in tongues harvesting
love off-season but in the tenement
of Mihrab they found a home &
journeyed back & sugared his mouth
a spoonful of sweet persimmon        & he
prayed take me before you take anyone
 
I sang
to a daughter adrift in the persistence
of memory         as she hid desire in
the crevice of the ceramic floor
when amidst Sajdah         she kissed me
homelike         I cradled her like my own
her face dribbled down my arms
feathering gathering to become whole
until she abandoned it         &         went home
faceless she told me she’d finally
escape the guilt of being woman
the lone daughter of Hawwa
 
I sang
to a son whose feet         gripped         me
like hands holding up         soapy
firmament of gods & though his touch
was hot mess he stayed mere inches
from visions of eden & though his
touch was slippery he distilled love
from abstract         plucked         flowers
from wastelands         perfumed them
himself & left me         with those flowers
& a smile that could sun
even         elegies
 
I sang
to a child with no mother no father
his weight the heaviest to carry
here my tongue         turned flamingo
too long for meaning         to traverse
through as he asked me to return
the love he could’ve had         I dreamed
of him turning into wild
cherry blossom
& if he sang back to me         I’d float
outside my body and see seas
of psalms sewn into people & ceded to
me as they turned homeward
but he’d come vacant         & never
leave
 
I sang
& sang & sang
swallowing sandals borrowing
bottle caps I birthed footprints lent
water         & sang & sang to
no god but
human
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
July 2024, Series Editor’s Choice

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Comment from the series editor, Megan O’Reilly: “Two things immediately struck me about Faizan Adil’s artwork: First, the cultural and religious significance, and second, the sense that the figures in the foreground seem to be lost in their own worlds, as though each is a universe unto themselves. Ammara Younas’s poem prioritizes both of these elements. The poet paints a vivid tapestry of the life of a Muslim family, and though the poem is superbly cohesive, each stanza dedicated to a family member could easily stand alone as its own poem. The distinctive language, both earthy and elegant—‘tongues harvesting/love off-season’; ‘dust trembling like a lost child’—mirrors the image’s contrast between ornate reverence and human humility, a dichotomy that is also encapsulated in the poem’s last stanza.”

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July 30, 2024

“What You Thought You Lost” by Wendy VidelockPosted by

Terry's Keys by Kim Beckham, photograph of keys hanging on a fence at a beach

Image: “Terry’s Keys” by Kim Beckham. “What You Thought You Lost” was written by Wendy Videlock for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, June 2024, and selected as the Editor’s Choice.

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Wendy Videlock

WHAT YOU THOUGHT YOU LOST

What you thought you lost along the way
hangs in the air like a prayer
 
May you find your way home
may the doors swing open wide
            from the out and the in
 
              side
 
under a wide open sky
May you lose
            may you find,
may you know
              in the core
of your weathered soul your old
 
and your new sign
 
May every stranger on the path
become the one who
                        stopped
 
to hang something you thought
you lost in the air
              by a thread like an ancient
pagan prayer
            like some kind of
elder
          warm-eyed
 
guardian was standing there.
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
June 2024, Editor’s Choice

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Comment from the series editor, Megan O’Reilly: “‘What You Thought You Lost’ begins with comparing what was lost to a prayer–an apt simile, given that this poem feels like a prayer, with its reverent language, melodic sound, and spiritual references. What a transcendent connection, too, the poet draws between the concrete image of keys hanging on a beach fence and the abstract concept of something lost (we don’t know what, but somehow we have a sense of it) hanging in the air ‘by a thread like an ancient/pagan prayer.’ There’s already an intangible quality to artist Kim Beckham’s beach scene, a sense of possibility, but the metaphysical tone of the poem adds greater complexity to the photo. One of the things I love most about the ekphrastic challenge is how differently I can see a piece of art after I read a poem about it, and ‘What You Thought You Lost’ made me look at this image in a way I never could have without it.”

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July 18, 2024

“Bigger Than Us” by Emily WalkerPosted by

Terry's Keys by Kim Beckham, photograph of keys hanging on a fence at a beach

Image: “Terry’s Keys” by Kim Beckham. “Bigger Than Us” was written by Emily Walker for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, June 2024, and selected as the Artist’s Choice.

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Emily Walker

BIGGER THAN US

we ran out shrieking
leaving our mark as
footprints in the sand
only stopping to
plant our keys on the fence
like a flag on the moon
terry, her short hair,
her red face,
said we owned the beach
and we could’ve
but the black-backed gulls
who mimicked our screeches,
they were thieves
the dunes were our country
the waves, our closest friends
the sun burnt us in continents
drawing maps on our backs and
painting our hair with streaks
of light, of day, of promise.
stay forever, we swore and
locked our pinkies till they bled
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
June 2024, Artist’s Choice

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Comment from the artist, Kim Beckham: “‘We ran out shrieking.’ I really like that the poet created characters and a world to fit the scene. They truly captured all of the senses in the images, sounds, and heat of Terry’s day at the beach. It felt really tight with the perfect image to punctuate the ending. Pinky swear!”

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June 27, 2024

“An Early Autumn Light that Unburies You” by Steven PanPosted by

Bird Ascending the Fire by Barbara Hageman Sarvis, painting in oranges and purples of a bird flying over a woodland lake

Image: “Bird Ascending the Fire” by Barbara Hageman Sarvis. “An Early Autumn Light that Unburies You” was written by Steven Pan for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, May 2024, and selected as the Editor’s Choice.

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Steven Pan

AN EARLY AUTUMN LIGHT THAT UNBURIES YOU

On earth, everything no longer
here is here in some variation
 
of light. An ice age
half-gone, all geography
 
shaved off youngest to oldest:
craters and lakes telling time
 
in reverse. Someday we’ll end
up there, you used to say,
 
pointing to the sun setting
over the strand. The season
 
and the leaves, starting
over again in a dream
 
with everything that lived
before this. Is it strange,
 
how a hurt that looked back
at you, looks like all of you
 
in the amber slowness
before evening. The detour
 
of your shadow
somewhere, casting a hook
 
over the water, perception
as imprecise as memory
 
or the autumn lingering
inside of it. Any year
 
straying no further
than the line of a robin’s
 
wings, the slight lean
of the trees that said life
 
held on. If I could call
you back, would this shore
 
be the one you’d wait on? How often
I mistake the sound of the wind
 
for the sound of your answer.
Your answer for a goodbye said
 
aloud. Goodbye for a matter
of time, or maybe a matter
 
of timing. Like a bird caught
mid-flight in the light
 
of the sky, brimming with everything
and nothing at once.
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
May 2024, Editor’s Choice

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Comment from the editor, Megan O’Reilly: “There are many aspects of ‘An Early Autumn Light that Unburies You’ that left an impression, from its smooth flow and musicality to its depth of meaning, but what stands out most, perhaps, is the way it’s peppered with gorgeous and brilliant turns of phrase–so many the effect could be overwhelming in the hands of a less adept poet. In the very same sentence, we find ‘The detour / of your shadow,’ ‘perception / as imprecise as memory’ (a stunningly insightful description), and ‘the autumn lingering / inside of it.’ One could read these lines many times and still be taken by the beauty and profundity of the poet’s language. When I first saw this image, I thought such a dramatic and striking piece of art would be challenging to match. I can’t imagine a better partner than this poem.”

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June 20, 2024

“Wildfire Dreams” by Linda Vandlac SmithPosted by

Bird Ascending the Fire by Barbara Hageman Sarvis, painting in oranges and purples of a bird flying over a woodland lake

Image: “Bird Ascending the Fire” by Barbara Hageman Sarvis. “Wildfire Dreams” was written by Linda Vandlac Smith for Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge, May 2024, and selected as the Artist’s Choice. (PDF / JPG)

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Linda Vandlac Smith

WILDFIRE DREAMS

at night sleep slides
its matchbox open
sparks old torches
a woodland of flares
twizzling up through
brittle boughs of
dream all wick from
roots to treetops
 
everywhere lake
laps heat’s edge at
the border of what is
and isn’t afire what is
wind or what creates
it as smoke makes its
lateral move through
curve of vision nearly
 
obfuscates a bird risen
from shadow’s char
not phoenix but drone
misshapen angel or
ancestor I cry out for
any stranger born into
a wildfire of dreams
only a distortion of
 
myself parting troubled
clouds making orange
apologies from within
the same dark scowl
that ignites thunderstorm
this incubator of flame
that renews forest
with one jagged strike
 

—from Ekphrastic Challenge
May 2024, Artist’s Choice

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Comment from the artist, Barbara Hageman Sarvis: “I loved the poems very much, but felt that the poet of ‘Wildfire Dreams’ did an excellent job creating words, metaphors, and a narrative that describe both literally and emotionally the visual imagery in my painting.”

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