Joan Eardley, Flood Tide, 1962Oil on board, 120.5x183cm
Lillie Art Gallery, East Dunbartonshire Council
The Scottish poet Edwin Morgan wrote this poem ten years ago in honour of Eardley and in response to her painting Flood Tide.
JOAN EARDLEY: FLOOD-TIDE
Edwin Morgan
Lonely people are drawn to the sea.
Not for this artist the surge and glitter of salons,
Clutch of a sherry or making polite conversation.
See her when she is free: –
Striding into the salty bluster of a cliff-top
In her paint-splashed corduroys,
Humming as she recalls the wild shy boys
She sketched in the city, allowing nature’s nations
Of grasses and wild shy flowers to stick
To the canvas they were blown against
By the mighty Catterline wind –
All becomes art, and as if it was incensed
By the painter’s brush the sea growls up
In a white flood.
The artist’s cup
Is overflowing with what she dares
To think is joy, caught unawares
As if on the wing. A solitary clover,
Unable to read WET PAINT, rolls over
Once, twice, and then it’s fixed,
Part of a field more human than the one
That took the gale and is now
As she is, beyond the sun.
You can find a reading of the poem by Morgan on the Glasgow Herald website here.
Enjoy...
With this little find I'll love you and leave you for a wee while as I venture towards my parents' temperamental internet connection in rural Germany.
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5 comments:
I share your love of this ocean scene. Then again, I grew up "on the beach", myself.
This is one of hers I haven't seen before and I love it! It could almost be Cornwall where I lived as a child :)
Lovely solstice sentiment. Thanks for the beauty of word and picture together
Yes, it's a great one. It's also one where I'm pleased it's in a public collection and not privately held. So there'll always be the chance to go back and take another peek at it again...
One of my favourite painters and the poem paints her so well. Thankyou.
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