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1 Feb 2022
Sharon
Phillips
New
Moon
Feb 16th
Inspiration
Jan 17th
After Käthe Kollwitz's Inspiration (1904/05)
and Sharpening the Scythe (1908)
perhaps this one’s
her muse
crouched at her back
his black wings outspread
her arms crushed
by his legs he grasps
her shoulder he grips
the scythe and growls
take it now take it
take your blade
and kill
*
or this charmer snuggling close
while she gazes into the distance,
her broad hands on her knees
and her shoulders set foursquare:
after her day at work in the fields
what wouldn’t she give to nod off
were it not for his thrilling whisper
yes oh yes this is the hour
*
alone in her hut
intent on the scour
of whetstone on iron
blade propped
against her face
her eyes half-shut
as she works
for the sake of
hungry children
raped women
men harnessed
like beasts
she tests her scythe
for keenness
Behind the poem...
This poem was initially inspired by Sharpening the Scythe, an image from Käthe Kollwitz’s Peasants’ War cycle. But as I got deeper into Kollwitz’s work, I realised this image was in turn the culmination of an earlier, rejected folio called Inspiration. Together, this tremendous sequence of images show Kollwitz’s increasing assertion of women’s power and agency: she first proposes a male muse, then rejects that notion for self-determination, in a way that reflects not only on the women depicted, but also on Kollwitz’s own trajectory as a woman, and as an artist.
