Lent with Van Gogh, part 6

"Sunflowers"

Hello, Poetry Friend

I cannot see this painting without also picturing Jason Sudeikis staring into its golden soul in the Ted Lasso episode from season 3 titled “Sunflowers.” It is my husband’s and my favorite episode in the entire series.

Sunflowers, Vincent Van Gogh, 1889, Van Gogh Museum

“Sunflowers” is the nadir — when everything changes for the characters. For Rebecca, especially. And for young William. For Collin. For Ted. The episode ends with all of AFC Richmond singing Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds” on the team bus.

You can do a lot with only three little birds. Van Gogh used only three shades of yellow to create “Sunflowers.”

When my daughter went off to school, the first playlist she created was called “Yellow.” It worked in well more than three shades — more like a different one for every song. I loved to play it while I was doing stuff around the house. I’d listen and feel grateful.

Ted Lasso looks into Van Gogh’s painting while in Amsterdam and feels a sharp longing for home, for Kansas. “Where I’m from — Kansas, my home — ” he tells the museum docent, “this here is our state flower.”

Van Gogh’s sunflowers are not his prettiest flowers. They look pulled from the roadside two days ago, and this is their last yellow day before they go full brown. And yet we stare, as if into home itself.

“Cause every little thing, gonna be alright.”

I Spy Yellow

all colors and descriptions from A Is for Azure by L.L. Barkat, illustrated by Donna Z. Falcone, the most poetic alphabet book you will ever find

you are a Brass-petaled field
a Jasmine coil
a Xanthic mix
sometimes I hear your Yellow hello
you are tucked in a Red bed for gold
you hide in plain sight in Kiwi
and Vermillion
and Umber
and Silver
even White
in the corners of Purple
along a Navy trail
on the far edge of an Iceberg stream
you are nowhere to be found in Fuchsia

I spy you
in a Cranberry twirl
and a Denim blue sea
perhaps that is you on the margins of an Orange flame
in the back of a Midnight terrain — a bulb blooming bright
until morning’s Tangerine sun

–Megan Willome

Next week: “Pieta.” Because Holy Week.

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