Las Dos Fridas
"Frida Kahlo’s most frequent theme was theThe bronzed Frida, easy long
skirt
Pale Frida, tailored eyebrows
legs relaxed and ankles crossed,
which cannot fly, mouth of the
blue blouse, lucious stripes
of gold.
of the public eye, Diego’s wife, takes
In her lap, left hand spools
blood from Bronzed Frida, whose veins
vessels of blood, which rise
circle Pale Frida’s lacy neck and feed
circling tan bare arm to the
a half heart, exposed upon a breast
great full heart. Then,
while rest of public bodice dissolves
across the tasty throat
into futile thoughts of white jungle roots.
veins reach up the neck
Circling the covered left arm,
and point the heart shaped
mouth,
a vessel richly red, is cut by
almond eyes. Bold, this
private Frida, Pale Frida’s hand,
lying politely in her lap.
young, beautiful, unscarred.
It splashes spidery blots and drips
Black hairs make feminine mustache
upon embroidered birds and flowers
and link eyebrows into wings
of birds. of the snowy wedding dress.
Secure, this Frida vessels
blood through
stormy skies to
Copyright 1998, Mary Lynne Evans
Mary Lynne Evans’ poetry has
appeared in previous issues of Switched-on Gutenberg, Stop doing
that!, Paper Boat, and Nobody's Orphaned Child (Red Sky
Poetry, 1996). She works as a land-use planner and lives in Seattle.
Her research project for this year is to test reality against poetry.
Switched-on Gutenberg
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