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Full
Moon
4 Dec 2025
Victoria
Spires
Lightfastness
After Frank Auerbach’s
Head of E. O. W. (1959-60)
Suggestible of something rending, something
Far from abstract – the exquisite flash
Of pain, as private teleology. Darkness,
Operating at the level of pre-confession. That
Friend, who knows us better than we know
Ourselves. The friend says, document the head
As object – you will learn how austerity lends
Enforced intimacy (since the cheapest charcoal
Can’t invent). The friend says, document again.
Smudge and scrape and flake and rub until
The otherness is all that’s left. Until light becomes
A scaffold, texture; something to keep us
From the trenches. The friend says, what if all
Thoughts are lies, that haven’t happened yet?
Behind the poem...
I spent a long time with Frank Auerbach’s Head of E. O. W. at the Courtauld Gallery’s exhibition of his portraits. These glowering heads, seemingly advancing from the shadows, pulled me towards them; wanted to whisper something of their experiences. I was deeply taken with Auerbach’s commitment to come to the truth of his subject by rendering it utterly strange. Endless reworking of the same drawing spoke to me of how we’re all engaged in the struggle to live within darkness – scaffold ourselves with whatever scraps of light we find there.