Matisse Blues

The blues in this painting by Matisse, converging as they do like a gymnast accomplishing the perfect flip, extend beyond the visual revelation into possibilities. To possibly become an aerial destination, seen from above, your jutting shoulder the ledge for a flock of birds. To hold in your writing hand a winning lottery ticket for a 1934 classic Buick convertible. To fall in love before three o’clock on this bucolic afternoon. To possibly, stupendously: stop a war. Dig out rot & corruption. Build an illumined shrine. Change the resonance of your voice, your wardrobe, & the way you dance. Personal failures, minor triumphs & dreams, converging as they do like a ball (spinning) made of clay, made of iron. A white star pulses in the human heart, an archetype as transformational as Sri Yantra. Possibly these shades of blue, pulsing cosmologically, as fulfilling as a yield of wheat, change everything at once. Do you see what you did Matisse?

Henri Matisse Nude Painting, Plaster Torso and Bouquet of Flowers, 1919, oil on canvas