The Linnet's Wings | Page 70

WINTER ' FOURTEEN Naked Beauty by Kathleen Cassen Mickelson Morning news. A photographer is interviewed about his new book of female nudes. He justifies his work, tosses around terms like beauty, genre, landscape, body-as-art. He says he created this book for women. whose foreheads furrow with thoughts that might precede questions and who choose to undress in the dark, while fully aware of their worth. Safe-for-television images appear on the screen I search for a body like mine: matured, well-traveled, lined, broken-in. There are none like that. I understand focus, tight frames, attraction to unblemished skin and stomachs un-stretched by motherhood, lips yet to be wrinkled by years of kisses and uttered words like “I love you”. But don’t tell me this book is for women. Be honest. You, Mr. Photographer, in your tightly-focused shots, left out the multitudes whose bodies languish beneath modest clothes. You ignored the women The Linnet's Wings Poetry, Winter 2014 Title: My Inner Colours, Artist: Máire Morrissey-Cummins