[Chris O'Carroll]

No 4224

Set by Leonora Casement
The Pre-Raphaelite Dante Gabriel Rossetti frequently wrote sonnets to accompany his pictures. We asked you to send in verses to any painting of your choice.

This week’s winners
Aha. A difference came to light over the interpretation of this competition. Some sent in verses that were simply about the painting, others sent in verses by the painter of the painting (à la Dante Gabriel Rossetti). Both attempts stood a chance, as this wasn’t spelt out. This proved to be a popular comp, and the list of hon menshes is long: Sally Harris, David Silverman, Brian Allgar, Sylvia Fairley and Chris O’Carroll. The winners can have £25 each, with a tenner going to Gavin Ross for his ingenious haiku. The overall winner is Nicholas Holbrook, who also gets some Tesco vouchers.

Campbell’s Soup Cans
by Andy Warhol
I’m painting cans of Campbell’s Soup
(Tomato, Beef and other gloop),
Assembled in a massive group,
Signed “Andy Warhol”,
“Andy . . . ”

“Can Campbell’s Soup can Campbell’s Soup?”
I chant my mantra’s mindless loop
And give my sycophantic troop
Dom Perignon and brandy.

It’s boring, painting cans of soup,
I feel my eyelids start to droop;
But if the finished work can dupe
The critics, then it’s dandy.

Next week, I’m painting doggypoop;
I’ll need to use a metal scoop –
An empty can of Campbell’s Soup
Will come in very handy.
Nicholas Holbrook


The Faithless Shepherd
by Pieter Brueghel the younger
What would anyone do in that wide open country
Seeing the wolf coming but take to their heels?
How much is he paid? Does he have any rights?

But the picture has him guilty. He should have stayed.
He’s big and strong, a match for any wolf.
That backward glance has him almost agreeing.

Or is he just checking out as he makes off,
hat in one hand, prime crook in the other,
that the wolf’s not going for him but for the lambs?

Chief executive or peasant, the red stockings judge him,
jar in that gentle ochre landscape,
proclaim the shame of those legs in flight.
Olivia McMahon

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp
by Rembrandt
O for a heart to teach these seven:
A heart from Tulp set free;
A heart that failed en route to Heaven . . .
Fine instruments you see!

O for an arm to teach these seven:
An arm from toil set free;
An arm so rare in rural Devon:
Chopped off from family tree!

O for a corpse to teach these seven:
A corpse from age set free;
A corpse to please Aneurin Bevan:
When NHS shall be!
Godfrey Holmes

The Arrival of Spring in Woldgate
by David Hockney
The woods crowd all around me, holding hands
And thrusting out the tips of pointed leaves;
Red, blue and yellow overwhelm the sense.
Try though I must I shall not break their bands.
The trees have taken me over. I cannot get
Them to stay in one place. In fact, I doubt
That I shall find myself. I am quite out
Of the picture, but if you come to Woldgate
You’ll find me trying to paint it. I was made
To be the problem solver, not the mess.
They have resolved me into nothingness –
I am “the green thought in the green shade”.
You who pass by – look! I have had my fling –
Whatever else, I have discovered spring.
John Purkis

The Wave
by Hokusai
Ten men in a boat
Too scared to take a last glance
At old Mount Fuji.
Gavin Ross