Joie de Vivre
Suzanne Morris
April 30, 2023
Willem de Kooning made me feel
as if
in a fit of fury he had sloshed paint
one bucket after another
at the unsuspecting canvas
then applied broad brush strokes
and squiggly lines,
calling the chaotic result his Art;
made me feel he was sloshing the paint
at me
as I stood uncomprehending
in a museum gallery, high-walled and
reverent.
Then I read in her obituary how this
much younger woman
changed de Kooning’s painting once
she became his muse
her joie de vivre infecting him,
making him love painting
as he had not done in years.
Chatting companionably out on
a big porch
in matching rocking chairs of
outsized, spindled wood frames,
the couple seem less like a
wealthy, influential arts patron
and a painter of international
renown,
than a pair of frisky pre-teens, fresh from
Friday’s school dismissal bell:
Mimi’s dark hair and
pixie smile
above a black turtleneck
and bare feet,
floppy-haired Willem in
horn-rimmed glasses,
wrinkled cargo pants and
moccasins, unlaced.
Could it be, under the
influence of Mimi,
Willem’s frog became
a prince?
Open to a change of heart, I return for
another look at
the pivotal painting she inspired, of the
place where first they met.
Promising myself I will not be intimidated
I inhale deeply and imagine
diving head-first into the painting’s
ocean blue
sun-spattered swirling
waves of
staggeringly bright
reds, yellows and greens
engulfing me, drenching me in their
energy and their light.
Emerging, then, I ride high above
on the wings of a great seabird
peering down at a
riotous topography of
garden paths meandering through
towering gladiolus, tulips, daffodils
and fringes of wispy sea grass,
neon green;
see a woman in sun hat and
off-the-shoulder dress
her forearm reaching from a
shimmery blue sleeve
toward a man’s outstretched hand,
her lips forming the words,
Am I ever going to see you again?
–After the obituary for Houston native Emilie “Mimi” Kilgore, December 25th, 2022, New York Times. Ms. Kilgore had served on the boards of Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts and the Contemporary Arts Museum.
Suzanne Morris is a novelist and poet. Her work is included in several poetry anthologies, most recently, Lone Star Poetry (Kallisto Gaia Press, 2022). Her poems have appeared in The Texas Poetry Assignment, The New Verse News, Stone Poetry Quarterly, The Pine Cone Review, Emblazoned Soul Review, and Creatopia Magazine. Ms. Morris lives in Cherokee County, Texas.
