Bone Graft (III)

Madder-root gave up alizarin

(dye for Redcoats, pigment

for battle-painters)

before Robiquet coaxed and stroked

the poppy-head, kodeia,

her curves softening

pain's splintery edge

like the spreading stain

beneath the brush,

the grip relaxing on the hilt,

the metallic mental box

unfolding into petals

before the bliss of sleep.

(French chemist Pierre-Jean Robiquet had already become famous for isolating the stable red dye alizarin from madder-root before he isolated codeine from the opium poppy in 1832. I found out about this when looking up the origin of the word codeine, which comes from kodeia, ancient Greek for poppy-head. I was interestd in the other story, too -- before he isolated alizarin - which has always been one of my favorite artist pigments - madder-root had been used for centuries as a red dye, but it wasn't stable. Robiquet discovered that madder contained two separate pigments - alizarin, which was extremely stable, and madder lake, which was not.)

Comments

[Uma Gowrishankar]

This is beautiful Beth, love these lines:
pain's splintery edge
like the spreading stain
beneath the brush

[Dick]

Gorgeous, Beth.

Somewhere I have a massive list of pigments copied down years ago in the shop of the last artist's colourman in East London. I must look it out - it reads as a poem in its own right!

[Beth]

Thank you, Uma!

Hi Dick, thanks -- Yes, you probably picked up on the fact that I love the word "alizarin" for itself, and was happy to try to work it into a poem. Now I should go look up where it comes from.

[Clive Hicks-Jenkins]

Before I post a comment on the poem, I thought I'd just check to see that the system is working. (Having lost a couple of comments here recently.)

[Natalie]

Yes, wonderful poem, and excellent pigment. I've never seen it labelled Brown Madder as it is on your paint tube - usually it says Alizarin Crimson or simply Laque de Garance in France. But maybe Brown Madder is another shade in that family?

[Beth]

I don't know, Natalie -- this tube is really old, it was in my great-aunt's paintbox, so it could be 50 years old or more! I've only seen "Alizarin Crimson" on modern tubes. What intrigued me what that the madder plant was named here.

[Natalie]

So that tube is really historical! How interesting that you have her paintbox.I wonder how different the quality of the paint is from its modern version - I'll bet the old one was better!