The Girl Who Talked to Paintings by Shannon K. Winston
The Girl Who Talked to Paintings, Poems by Shannon K. Winston
Publisher: Glass Lyre Press, 2021
Purchase @ Glass Lyre Press
Publisher: Glass Lyre Press, 2021
Purchase @ Glass Lyre Press
Review by Arthur McMaster.
In “Ways to View Joan Miró’s Triptych Bleu I, II, III,” the opening poem of this splendid collection, Shannon K. Winston offers “These / tiny openings.” What the poet implies here is that even the smallest window can reveal so much, if only we’d stop to see. And what gorgeous revelations open to us when we do.
Arguably, our best poems will contain and sometimes begin with discrete observation. One insight leads to more. A flower opening and unfolding—complexities revealed. For Winston, childhood reflections are among the strongest and most compelling in the volume. Consider: “Nine years old. I’m sitting / by my father on the front / porch watching / lightning slice the sky. // Me, his greatest regret: / a daughter, not a son. / … a father / I could no longer talk to.” The poem is all the more powerful by what is suggested, not said. The poet complicates the narrative by letting the reader do the necessary work revealed, via “these tiny openings.”
Winston demonstrates a mastery of both form and free verse as fully as she captures a range of mood and subject matter, though poems about her enigmatic father tend to stand out. While her four prose poems inform as any tightly drawn narrative must, her villanelle “Why He Left” is nothing short of stunning. Let’s take a look. She opens with the summary, “I don’t know. I invent so many stories about my father.” Now, she will explore possibilities. “Perhaps he was a prince. A tailor, / a train conductor who gave chocolates to everyone in his compartment.” Later, “Still, each night I studied how to be a good daughter. / … alone in my apartment.” But it’s the powerful couplet to close that draws us: “I invent so many stories about my father. About strangers. / I scribble in Post-it notes, turn them into boats, set them adrift in water.”
Let’s move on to the title poem, “The Girl Who Talked to Paintings.” Begin with the epigraph; “For Katherine Millet, the original subject of John Singer Sargent’s Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose.” This is a seven-part poem of introspection. And don’t we all need some of that? It is also an exploration of common ground shared between and among remarkable women, all in search of something like clarity. Or maybe coherence. Certainly not perfection. That’s a bridge too far.
Let’s settle for completion.
Among the many startling images we find, and delight in, “I, too, was a first draft, a sketch, half baked… / I felt like a mistake.” In the fourth stanza: “Be better. Would my father love me then?” Later, “I scanned each day for my mistakes: five, ten, / twenty, thirty times / … Be good. I was his curious daughter.” The awkwardness is palpable, but necessary for the coming, strong resolution. How the poet connects, perhaps melds, with the painting is offered in stanza six. “Yes. Sargent’s girls, too, wear costumes. Each one / in a dress (nightgown) to match the lilies. / The white ruffles itched their skin, the lantern’s / glow chafed their hands…” At the end, now more fully understanding, she tells us, “…The way love is confused with beauty. / The way Sargent is and is not my father.”
The poet returns to John Singer Sargent and his study for Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose with “Flower Girl,” and here the way ahead is more clear. The past is past. We observe. We move and and survive the second-guessing awkwardness and clumsiness. The uncertainty. Like mature flowers, we bloom and shine, and now all the stronger. That’s the true beauty. That’s all that really matters, isn’t it? This is the voice of a gifted, strong, and confident poet.
In “Ways to View Joan Miró’s Triptych Bleu I, II, III,” the opening poem of this splendid collection, Shannon K. Winston offers “These / tiny openings.” What the poet implies here is that even the smallest window can reveal so much, if only we’d stop to see. And what gorgeous revelations open to us when we do.
Arguably, our best poems will contain and sometimes begin with discrete observation. One insight leads to more. A flower opening and unfolding—complexities revealed. For Winston, childhood reflections are among the strongest and most compelling in the volume. Consider: “Nine years old. I’m sitting / by my father on the front / porch watching / lightning slice the sky. // Me, his greatest regret: / a daughter, not a son. / … a father / I could no longer talk to.” The poem is all the more powerful by what is suggested, not said. The poet complicates the narrative by letting the reader do the necessary work revealed, via “these tiny openings.”
Winston demonstrates a mastery of both form and free verse as fully as she captures a range of mood and subject matter, though poems about her enigmatic father tend to stand out. While her four prose poems inform as any tightly drawn narrative must, her villanelle “Why He Left” is nothing short of stunning. Let’s take a look. She opens with the summary, “I don’t know. I invent so many stories about my father.” Now, she will explore possibilities. “Perhaps he was a prince. A tailor, / a train conductor who gave chocolates to everyone in his compartment.” Later, “Still, each night I studied how to be a good daughter. / … alone in my apartment.” But it’s the powerful couplet to close that draws us: “I invent so many stories about my father. About strangers. / I scribble in Post-it notes, turn them into boats, set them adrift in water.”
Let’s move on to the title poem, “The Girl Who Talked to Paintings.” Begin with the epigraph; “For Katherine Millet, the original subject of John Singer Sargent’s Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose.” This is a seven-part poem of introspection. And don’t we all need some of that? It is also an exploration of common ground shared between and among remarkable women, all in search of something like clarity. Or maybe coherence. Certainly not perfection. That’s a bridge too far.
Let’s settle for completion.
Among the many startling images we find, and delight in, “I, too, was a first draft, a sketch, half baked… / I felt like a mistake.” In the fourth stanza: “Be better. Would my father love me then?” Later, “I scanned each day for my mistakes: five, ten, / twenty, thirty times / … Be good. I was his curious daughter.” The awkwardness is palpable, but necessary for the coming, strong resolution. How the poet connects, perhaps melds, with the painting is offered in stanza six. “Yes. Sargent’s girls, too, wear costumes. Each one / in a dress (nightgown) to match the lilies. / The white ruffles itched their skin, the lantern’s / glow chafed their hands…” At the end, now more fully understanding, she tells us, “…The way love is confused with beauty. / The way Sargent is and is not my father.”
The poet returns to John Singer Sargent and his study for Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose with “Flower Girl,” and here the way ahead is more clear. The past is past. We observe. We move and and survive the second-guessing awkwardness and clumsiness. The uncertainty. Like mature flowers, we bloom and shine, and now all the stronger. That’s the true beauty. That’s all that really matters, isn’t it? This is the voice of a gifted, strong, and confident poet.
Winner of of 2017 Poetry of the South Carolina’s Society Prize, Arthur McMaster taught writing and literature courses for fourteen years at South Carolina colleges and universities. With an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Florida, he has published poetry and fiction with several major literary journals and has three published volumes of poems, most recently The Whole Picture Show, from Revival Press, in Ireland. Retired in 2018 from Converse College, Arthur now teaches in the continuing education program at Furman University.