John William Godward, English
Get Rid of Those Turkey Arms in Just 10 Minutes a Day, With the New “Statue of Liberty Workout!,” 1894
Oil on canvas
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Info about this artist is pointed to by my comment and replies at another blog entry.
/// Godward painted a girl Winding Wool
in a Pompeian Garden. She’ll pull
the wool spindle up high,
lest some moths should fly by
and undo her work, eating their full.
/// Concentrating on pulling threads taut,
she may banish all troublesome thought.
Papa warned her to pay no
heed to nearby volcano.
Smoking had the girl feeling distraught.
/// Young Plotilla had never been bold,
she would always do just as she’s told.
So her work’s interruption
by a nearby eruption
guaranteed that she’d never grow old.
/// Her calm garden was filled in a flash
with a ton of thick burning hot ash.
She was buried inside
and she instantly died
with no time to change posture or thrash.
/// Ancient History books all enshrine,
in October, year seventy-nine,
as the Volcano Day
(when it buried Pompeii).
Great Vesuvius; mountain malign.
/// As the long years passed, much would enfold,
(though the story would not have consoled
her). The flow pyroclastic
made macabre and fantastic
statues out of a full-body mold.
/// A stone image in perfect condition,
replaced flesh lost to decomposition.
Experts unearthed Plotilla
from her long-buried villa.
Tried… but couldn’t explain her position.
/// She was found with right arm on her thigh,
and the left stretched behind her up high.
Legs together, knees bent,
head nods down (in assent?),
all together, an odd way to die.