Your husband, Nicolas advised a king
Royal gold lending luster to his name
Your’s overshadowed by pendant and ring
Known only as wife in your brushstoked fame
💀
Were you an object, even in your own time?
Only there to adorn your husband’s sleeve
History often commits this crime
Against the daughters of curious Eve
☠️
Forever captured in corset and frame
Pretty bows can’t hide your resignation
Melancholy eyes, your lot in life proclaims
Or are my reflections pure conflation?
💀
Another man obsessed with legacy
Reducing you to memento mori
——————-
Authors note:
The painting is “Portrait of a Woman, wife of Nicolas Hellincx” by Frans Pourbus the Younger. I saw this at the National Gallery of Ireland and was drawn to her expression, which appears to me to be resignation or disappointment. But I was also struck by the fact that while we know her husband, somehow her first name has been lost to us, according to its little placard:
About the Creator
Sean A.
A happy guy that tends to write a little cynically. Just my way of dealing with the world outside my joyous little bubble.
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