Passion Fruits
(On Diego Rivera’s Portrait of Senora Dona Elena Flores de Carillo, 1953)
Diego has extracted its essence
to a simple, delicious matter
of rich gold-yellow,
luscious red, and dark chocolate brown.
For you, me, and Frieda Kahlo
perhaps
sex, femininity, fertility
would be complex mishmash.
But Diego sweeps from giant papaya
and ripe mango
to enticing gold dress upon a matching sheet,
the racy red bindings of her shoes,
winding toward glowing red shadows of her inner calves,
restrained for the moment by red painted fingernails
and tightly pursed lips.
The arch of red flowers behind
and matching chocolate hair and eyes
carry our gaze to the other fruit,
the gorgeous child
suited in yellow, as sweet
as the fruits
and love