Christina's Other World
The woman gazing across a field
looks young and carefree
on a tranquil afternoon. Her hair
is tied back loosely, wisps escaping
in an imagined summer breeze, legs folded
beneath her in a graceful pose, frock
a muted shade of pink. The scene looks
peaceful, pastoral. An observer might
fail to notice the tension in her left arm,
driving her forward, the right arm
braced behind, head straining toward
a house on the brow of the hill, compelling her
from where she’s dragged herself
on hands and knees, as she does daily,
without complaint, to accomplish her tasks,
refusing help as she’s always done,
crippled from childhood. Here she has
allowed the artist to capture her beauty
in deceptive repose, not scrabbling through
grass, gravel, or mud on bone thin arms,
to dig and weed and plant, scorning the sticks
she’s been offered to ease her through
the tortuous transitions. Her whole body seems to
yearn toward the grey farmhouse in the distance.
The artist offers only the subtlest of clues --
leaves the observer to unearth the back-story--
a curious balancing act between what we think
we see, and what is truly there.
Christina’s World, Andrew Wyeth (1948)