each schoolboy used to know the saw
laid deep in tracts of Danish lore

Forkbeards pious son and heir
Cnut the great, konungr,

his throne set to the boiling awe
somewhere along a Hampshire shore

but was it somewhat further north
he faced down scorned Ægir’s bore

his person kissed by Trisantona
upon her banks at Gainsborough

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

     An LGBTRDCST Deconstruction of Gainsborough’s Blue Boy

Blue Boy must be examined through the lens
Of neo-post-colonial queer theory
And LGBT hegemonism
Inverted as bourgeois sentimentalism

It subverts the trope of trans-feminism
As a patriarchal gesture of scorn
Plasticized in pale iridescent blue
And transgressive in its imposture

Or maybe it’s some kid bribed with a shilling
To pose for this picture, however unwilling

To my left,
there is the Neoclassical beauty,
profile drawn by David himself,
delicate,
bright eyes, reminiscent of Gainsborough.

The Rubeniste sits in front of me,
full figured, though not as colorful
as the Graces.

Behind me lurks the Rembrandt,
moody, dark,
in the chiaroscuro of a leather jacket
and tousled hair.

Here I am.
With my Schiele hands,
Rosetti lips,
but without the quiet grace
or distortion of either.