Henry Matisse Walsall Art Gallery 2010 Poem by John Rickell

The hall filled with cut-outs
birds and beasts and flowers
spread in cheering profusion
on walls of purest white.
Best of all the ladies
articulate limbs, lithe and blue
understated beauties
cast in scissor strokes
framed in plainest wood and glass,
silent on the wall
speaking for themselves.
Four friends with leather heels
crept between the frames,
shared delight of the silent forms,
while I agreed on the hard wood bench.
I had not been for many weeks,
too much trivia had concerned my days.
I drove in sun and cloud,
half an hour of lunchtime traffic,
relax with carrot cake and coffee
pay homage to the silhouettes
strolled the other halls,
then refreshed and new again
to the turmoil of the street
lost in the tangle of the car.