Francis Bacon’s Studio Poem by Sheena Blackhall

William Blake’s head
Rears through the chaos

There is a photo of a Zebra carcass,
Gracefully rotting on the floor

There are brushes,
Plonked in jars like dried, splayed, flowers

There are paint rags, rainbowed trays,
Mammoth brushes eager to be up and doing
A ceramic bowl as a palette

7,000 items, all exactly transplanted
Suspended animation of a painter’s life space
Including:
570 artist books and catalogues
100 slashed canvases
1,300 leaves torn from books
2,000 artist materials
70 drawings
Correspondence, magazines
Paint spattered furniture
Vinyl records. The walls, doubling as palettes
And an untitled unfinished self portrait
Found on the easel after Bacon’s death

A canvas holds a circular outline
Made by a dustbin lid
Bare light bulbs hang from sinister flexes
No shades, glaring, stark
Sinister echoes of the Furies
Daemons, Disaster, Drink

His father’s grooms horsewhipped him as a child
For being different, dressing in woman’s clothes

He grew to love rough trade and burglars,
The fringe men of Society

No wonder his Pope screamed
Popes should scream against
The victimization of the not-the-same