Lent with Van Gogh, part 1

"Wheatfield with a Reaper"

Hello, Poetry Friend

Recently I had a bad case of Imposter Syndrome. I went from being over-the-moon excited about telling everyone about my new poetry collection to walking out of the library without giving a book launch/birthday party bookmark to the person I went in there to give it to.

Which brings me to Van Gogh.

The next morning I was sitting on my couch, huddled in a blanket, drinking hot tea, and I thinking how insecurities are like weeds.

Immediately I had an image of a field, and it was “Van Gogh golden.” I knew what that looked like, but not what it meant. I felt like Jesus was inviting me to walk through that field with him. And so … a Lenten-Van Gogh project was launched.

Wheatfield with a Reaper, Vincent Van Gogh, 1889, Van Gogh Museum

Last year a friend who lives where March means it is still winter, said it was hard to suffer through Lent when you’re still suffering through a long, long winter. I told her it’s strange down here because the first week of March is when everything begins to come up spring, and it feels weird to add in a swallow of suffering to what is The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. (Just ask the hundreds of thousands of tourists who visit my little ‘burg in March and April.)

Lent is the time to prepare for the reaper. See him there, in blue, with a sickle? He is the color of the distant hills. In the field, all is golden. The wheat cannot get from here to there without being reaped.

Welcome, golden sun.

Psalm 37

Let’s take a walk, Jesus says, and holds out his hand.
I take it. 
This field is too gold to be believed.
 
I expect a sermon,
at the very least, a parable. 
Instead

He murmurs, as if he contains starlings.
He carps.
He grouses.
He croaks, and a frog answers.
I didn’t know crabs made a sound until he crabs, 
   and claws are raised in Amen.
His yowl brings a sheepdog, who barks a reply and runs off. 
   The faithful friend returns hours later with a lamb.
He bleats. The lamb bleats back.

I mumble something about building some kind of zoo 
   right now, right here, but while I am still babbling
He moans, Shhh. This is Van Gogh gold. 

–Megan Willome

Next week: Before the reaper comes “The Sower.”

P.S. During this series I am writing ekphrastic poems — poems inspired by art. If you’d like to write a poem from this week’s Van Gogh painting, please share in the comments.

Happy poeming!

Megan