Contemporary Poetry

lyric subjects 43

Been awake for it, except that the day

Is ending and it will be hard for you

To get to sleep tonight, at least until late. (p. 195 )

Periphrasis in this section creates an extensive refl ection which
challenges any defi nitive sense of space and time. The depiction of
the snow focuses on the impossibility of underscoring an event as
fi nished or complete. Moreover, the instability of ‘you’ and ‘one’
suggests that both speaker and artist perform interchangeable roles.
At each stage the poet attempts to inscribe into the painting a nar-
rative of movement, process and creation. Daringly, in this poem
he suggests that the creating of art is not dissimilar to the errors,
misunderstandings and misinterpretations which are central to
the game ‘Chinese whispers’. Ashbery points to the intrusion,
which twists ‘the end result / Into a caricature of itself’ (p. 201 ).
Commenting on artistic intention and agency he suggests that a
similar principle ‘makes works of art so unlike / What the artist
intended’ (p. 201 ). Ashbery’s highly self-refl exive writing, with
its digressive techniques, aims to energise the texture of the poem,
enacting processes of creation and perception. Daring to circum-
navigate the subject of his poems, Ashbery’s periphrastic progress
challenges our idea of poetic expression. The poet remarks that
the challenges in the artistic avant-garde could equally apply to
his own work: ‘Most reckless things are beautiful in some way,
and recklessness is what makes experimental art beautiful, just as
religions are beautiful because of the strong possibility that they are
founded on nothing.’^35
Indian poet Sujata Bhatt approaches painting and in particular
self-portraiture as an important framing device for her volumes
The Stinking Rose ( 1995 ) and A Colour for Solitude ( 2002 ).^36
The Stinking Rose places a focus on the self-portraiture of early
twentieth-century Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. Her paintings are
renowned for their painful autobiographical subject matter and her
groundbreaking use of the indigenous cultures of Mexico. Kahlo’s
self-portraits do not fl inch from depicting her own shattered spinal
column, miscarriages, intense physical pain or representations of
explicit sexuality. Bhatt considers The Stinking Rose as movement
away from early work, stating ‘I consciously avoided writing about