The Tempest by Isobel Dixon

After Sarah Pickstone’s painting The Tempest

Don’t we all want a green and pure ferocity,
the lashing rain to make us naked to ourselves.
Thwarted, aslant against our lives,
lean instead into a wind that strips
the stirrup and the girth, unseats the toad.
It’s a jungle, baby, enter it, the typhoon haze,
without the benefit of Rousseau’s perky lines.
Even the predators have not quite yet materialised.
Make of it what you will, brave chaos, monsoon visionary.
Bright cuneiform, horizon’s etched electric virtuosity.
Come if you want to, we’re not Adam and Eve,
this is not about you – this is not about me.
It’s about the storm, and what the wilful
torrent cursives down, cadence on candid skin.