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New
Moon
14 Jul 2026
Elizabeth
Fevyer
Seule
After the painting of the same name
by Henri Toulouse-Lautrec
Except she was never alone. His eyes set wide
against the cardboard curtain. Sketching skies
of petticoats. A subtle finger. And how many
goes did it take before he was satisfied?
Figure 1a: Woman on unmade bed
Figure 1b: Woman unmade, on bed
And all the while an ecstasy of white.
Re-virginised, but for the smoked-out
chimneys of her legs, spread wide beneath
the cyanide contour of her hand.
Don’t think her fooled. See the clench
of chin praised to the ceiling. The readiness
of her thumb. She knew he was there,
always. To consummate her solitude,
shape her to his gaze.
Behind the poem...
My poem came about after seeing Henri Toulouse-Lautrec’s Seule (Alone) at the Musée d'Orsay – a moment of private languor and contemplation the world was never meant to see. I thought of the hardships endured by sex workers in late 19th-century Paris; and too, of the paradoxical experience of many women today: alone, yet never left alone. With the male gaze everywhere in this poem, I wanted to convey the active awareness and awakening I see in the subject of Toulouse-Lautrec’s painting.