Variations on flags: handmade and
bold, uneven and overlapping.
They scrabble
As the outline of each form falters,
shape-shifting, shuffling and
rearranging.
Imposing angles jut and veer,
They bear down, push out, move
across
But when they know themselves there’s
space
A cavity through which to breathe
long, to breathe deeply.
That sharp lemon light, an intravenous
muscle relaxant.
An awkward cream pyramid, bathed
in a single invisible sunbeam. Near
luminescent.
Purple cloud atop a bulging mountain,
a comically ill-fitting hat.
The modest streak of lightest blue
stretched out below a grainy open sky,
Negligible but necessary
Nothing flighty,
Not even the butterfly whose shadow
is frozen in a frame of mustard yellow.
The impact of colour brushing colour
taut.
Then unleashed.
Tantalising forms nestle alongside
the familiarity of a house, a roof, a
horizon, a boat,
A circle, a triangle, an angle.
Gentle contrasts of texture and
opacity: they absorb us and hold us at
bay.
The blurred seams of these simple
things.
Lizzie Lloyd. 2014