becoming julie, by Lauren Marshall

In the morning, when the eternity of sunlight

presses through the sky and glares in to the hollows of a life like mine.

I ask myself, who is there behind the curtain?

Is it a man, or a woman?

And whose destiny falls upon the sword that lies riddled amongst my clothes and bedsheets on the floor,

Like Chekhov’s gun?

Riddled amongst my clothes and bedsheets on the floor, welcome to my body, welcome to France.

Welcome to the court, welcome to the opera, a web of men and women.

Women to be loved, men to be jousted, women to be eaten, men to be killed

Hot grainy coffee, and we don’t speak of street corner gossip.

An impossible love between two women

Falling dust caught in rays of invisible light.

I see your long look. There is only one woman here.

I would be sorry, but being is not a state of affairs

Governed by the mind

Just as loving is not governed by the heart

A cruel sexuality of morning light

Threatens the androgynous cloak of night

Another life waits for me

Beyond that veil that flame of the body

Switched from darkness to light

I learned to fight, and to watch men die

Don’t ask me whose blood is that

Some kind of birth

I emerge

Beauty and Pain: Musical Portrait of Artemisia Gentileschi
By Rebekah Novinger

Standing there among the colors this is what I knew

Red for blood, green for grass and blue for sky

Such a world my father painted mixing the colors

Such a world I painted as a sweet child

Sweet child what did you see?

Sweet child what do you know?

Sweet child if you asked me today

II would say…

Beauty and pain

Here I am no more a child

Traveling the world, mixing the colors

For dukes and princes queens and friends alike

And yet it seems my stories been forgotten

Bleached away

Sweet child what do you want?

Sweet child what would you say?

Sweet child if you asked me today

II would tell of a life filled with

Beauty and pain.

A young girl and painting Susanna and the Elders

My first public work shows two men as they lurk

While Susanna is bathing

A beauty, my painting, a young thing.

Time moves forward here I am mixing the colors

Father’s gone, but not for long, work called him away

And soon they came, devils at the gate

Devils were lurking, breaking and entering

Climbing the stairs, seeing me there

He came for me.

Devil of lust, between my knees

Tried to break free, I screamed

Age seventeen.

It is true, it is true.

These are the words I spoke on trial;

As pain raged through my pulsing hands,

Hands built for beauty.

I told the judge he came by force.

I scratched his face, he wouldn’t stop;

I threw a knife;

Torture me or not, my story is the same.

It is true.

My father stood beside me; the witnesses they came;

The judge declared him guilty.

Eight months they kept him;

Devil of lust.

I’m married now; off to Florence

I’m studying now at Academia del Disegno

And some say it’s shocking but I say—

Let them laugh, let them talk

Surely not, they say can this be true

Florence academy has a lady, yes

Soon you’ll see, what a woman can do

Studies, it brought a new king of freedome

Finally I could contract my art

No longer was man’s signature needed

There' I could paint desires of the heart

Let them laugh, let them talk

Surely not, they say can this be true

Grand Duke of Tuscany commissions frequently

I’ll show you what a woman can do

Then after a while, I soon had a daughter

My husband was foolish and money ran low

Soon after that I took on a lover

Leaving the husband we traveled to Rome.

Let them laugh, let them talk

Surely not, they say can this be true

Two women traveling no men accompanying

Yes, indeed, it’s a new world you fools

Not much in Rome, we moved on to Venice

A little of this, and a little of that

Age thirty-seven we moved on to Naples

When father in London called me for a task

Let them laugh, let them talk

Surely not, they say can this be true

Painting in courts like her father before her

I’ll show you what a woman can do.

At age sixty all was dark;

Death had come through plague and time

All around was art from days gone by

Sweet little child of my memory

Look at the life that you made

Painting the colors of history

Brought change

If you desire to make beauty

Within a world of great paint

Leave all the voices behind you

And create.

Some will see a life of paint

Others will the beauty view

All I know is life brings you both

Beauty and pain.