Friedrich von Amerling, Austrian
“Hey Friedrich, Why Is It That Every Time You Paint Me, My Face Is in the Dark? Ever Hear of a Ring Light?,” 1838
Oil on canvas
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/// When The Young Eastern Woman stopped reading,
she looked up to see if she’s succeeding
in pretending she might
be a Turkish Delight.
“Orientalist” garb is misleading.
/// The girl felt a bit silly at first,
but this style slaked a definite thirst.
People then had a passion
for this colorful fashion
(and some men with attraction would burst).
/// She is trying to come off exotic.
This look was, in her day, a narcotic.
Men could not get enough
of this faux-harem stuff
which made Viennese schoolgirls erotic.
/// The dim lighting and her tousled hair
made it seem that it was bedtime there.
Her pale flesh, white as milk,
clothed in loose robes of silk,
made some think that beneath she was bare.
/// This cute sprite does her reading at night
in a room with one book-focused light.
‘Neath her desk, in the shade,
the girl’s bare legs are splayed,
but her sex appeal’s hidden from sight.
/// She is worried how little she hears
with that thick turban pressing both ears.
Some unscrupulous guy
might, in silence come by,
so she scans the room, frozen with fears.
/// Since The Young Eastern Woman is seen
in apparel that’s Turkish, she’s keen
to let everyone know
that she’s Austrian, so
she is “eastern” because she’s from Wien.
/// In her turban of Turkish chiffon
she’d been trying to read the Koran,
but a pain in the neck
made her stop for a sec
and to stretch her long neck like a swan.
/// The Koran wasn’t easy to follow,
for her German translation seemed hollow.
(Österreich books perplex
those with ostrich-length necks
if the content is too hard to swallow.)