Vincent suffered so that his admirers could enjoy
what he could never sell, but brilliantly painted,
suffering, which can be thought painful, a successful ploy,
even if its victims haven’t by the Church been sainted.

Sunflowers: a favorite object he portrayed eleven
times. Perhaps he thought they suffer, since like Icarus
they try but fail to reach the sun, like most saints’ heaven,
as he tried with his art, not like his father vicarious.

Before they start to wilt, sunflowers follow
the sun calamitously, like Clytie, who when  attracted
to Helios was compelled to follow, as a heliotrope, Apollo,
perhaps inspiring Vincent’s art, as painfully redacted.

Sharing Nazi-proscribed yellow stars’ solacious color,
in Sydney Muslims globalized the intifada,
a policy approved far more in Qatar than, I think, by Allah,
whose worshippers Spain expelled before Britannia drowned Spain’s Armada.
Recalling not just sunflowers........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)