The Lovers’ Chronicle 16 April – not with words – art by Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun & Ford Madox Brown – verse by Anatole France

Dear Zazie,

Here is today’s Lovers’ Chronicle from Mac Tag.

Rhett

The Lovers’ Chronicle

Dear Muse,

certainly mostly with
“Of course”
there are moments
when more happens
“The way we end our days”
yes, our favorite time
“After you read poetry to me”
words precede, flow through
punctuatin’ our time together
“From the conjuring”
to the ones i write for you
but now, is the time
for more than words

© copyright 2023 mac tag/cowboycoleridge all rights reserved

they have never
let me down
turn on the spigot
and they flow
sometimes effortlessly
other times, the valve
must be opened full tilt

fixin’ to be six years
that they have been
comin’, findin’ their way
every day to enlighten,
to make carryin’ the burden
just a little easier

© copyright 2022.2023 mac tag/cowboycoleridge all rights reserved

the tale has been good
it just lacks completeness
words are only vain sounds
if you cannot feel them
instinct is enough
sinkin’ into the wide chair,
speechless, leanin’ forward,
wrappin’ a blanket snugly
around, presently a whisper
i plight thee my troth
in this first new hour

© copyright 2021 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

they are all i have
i will write myself
outta this one

the birth of the end
a few months ago
exact date, not sure

stripped of feelin’s
my own damn fault
then this pandemic

Schopenhauer was right
all will be well because
whatever happens

day and time fade away

© copyright 2020.2023 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

nothin’ compares
dull would be without this

the night now doth wear
the fallin’ last light; silent, bare,

hills and river lie
open unto the big sky

ne’er did two need more
in this splendour
ne’er felt we, so deep

abideth here at our will
the very source of want

© copyright 2019 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

for you
all of this
of you
about you
(so now y’all know
who to blame)

of course,
there are never
enough words,
nor melodies,
nor sketches

not to mention
that there will never
be enough time

for you

© copyright 2018 mac tag/cowboy coleridge all rights reserved

not the sort to keep
anyone happy
“But you should try!”

sinkin’ by his chair,
hidin’ her face on his knees

speechless, he leaned forward
and wrapped his arms round her
the Navajo blanket fell over them
presently a whisper…

you have beat me
how can i fight this

she answered nothin’

not with words, not even
with meetin’ eyes,
did they plight their troth
in this first new hour

© copyright 2016 Mac Tag all rights reserved

 

Today is the birthday of Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun (Marie Élisabeth Louise; Paris 16 April 1755 – 30 March 1842 Paris) also known as Madame Lebrun; painter.  Her artistic style is generally considered part of the aftermath of Rococo, while she often adopted a neoclassical style.  While serving as the portrait painter to Marie Antoinette, Vigée Le Brun works purely in Rococo in both her color and style choices.  Vigée Le Brun left a legacy of 660 portraits and 200 landscapes.

Gallery

 
Self-portrait in a Straw Hat by Elisabeth-Louise Vigée-Lebrun.jpg

Self-portrait in a Straw Hat, 1782.
Countess Siemontkowsky Bystry 1793

Countess Siemontkowsky Bystry 1793

Self-portrait with her daughter Jeanne-Lucie, 1786

Portrait of Marie Antoinette, 1783

Marie Antoinette and her Children, 1787

Today is the birthday of Ford Madox Brown (Calais, France 16 April 1821 – 6 October 1893 London); painter of moral and historical subjects, notable for his distinctively graphic and often Hogarthian version of the Pre-Raphaelite style.  Perhaps his most notable painting was Work (1852–1865).  Brown spent the latter years of his life painting the Manchester Murals, depicting Mancunian history, for Manchester Town Hall.

Gallery

 
Ford madox brown.jpg

Self-portrait 1850
Thinking, his wife emme

Thinking, his wife emma

The Convalescent (A Portrait of the Artist's Wife)

The Convalescent (A Portrait of the Artist’s Wife)

Brown’s Jacob and Joseph’s Coat at Museo de Arte de Ponce, Ponce, Puerto Rico

 The Bromley Family. Brown’s first wife Elizabeth, lower right, 1844

 Pretty Baa-Lambs. Browns mistress Emma and second daughter Cathy in 1851

Anatole_France_young_yearsToday is the birthday of Anatole France (born François-Anatole Thibault, Paris 16 April 1844 – 12 October 1924 Tours); poet, journalist, and novelist.  Ironic and skeptical, he was considered in his day the ideal French man of letters.  He was a member of the Académie française, and won the 1921 Nobel Prize in Literature “in recognition of his brilliant literary achievements, characterized as they are by a nobility of style, a profound human sympathy, grace, and a true Gallic temperament”.  France is also widely believed to be the model for narrator Marcel’s literary idol Bergotte in Marcel Proust‘s In Search of Lost Time.

Les plus beaux mots du monde ne sont que de vains sons, si on ne les comprend pas.

  • The finest words in the world are only vain sounds, if you cannot comprehend them.
    • Series I : Propos de rentrée: la terre et la langue

En art comme en amour, l’instinct suffit.

  • In art as in love, instinct is enough.
    • Le Jardin d’Épicure [The Garden of Epicurus] (1894)

Un conte sans amour est comme du boudin sans moutarde; c’est chose insipide.

  • A tale without love is like beef without mustard: insipid.
    • La Révolte des Anges [The Revolt of the Angels], (1914), ch. VIII

On devient bon écrivain comme on devient bon menuisier: en rabotant ses phrases.

  • You become a good writer just as you become a good joiner: by planing down your sentences.
    • As quoted in Anatole France en pantoufles by Jean-Jacques Brousson (1924); published in English as Anatole France Himself: A Boswellian Record by His Secretary, Jean-Jacques Brousson (1925), trans. John Pollock, p. 85

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