frida & diego

found in the words of frida
kahlo & diego
rivera

take a lover who wants you disheveled
with all that wakes you in haste
& the demons that won’t let you sleep.

take a lover who sees you,
you bourbon bisket :
a love that takes away lies, brings you
hope,
coffee &
poetry.

I don’t like the gringos at all. (They are boring,
faces like unbaked rolls.) I sky you

my wings extend so large : my whole
being opened for you — I

(that clumsy
human) : your green eyes, swords

inside my flesh. I ask for violence
the tangible form of my <3
[my confusion] :

acid & tender, hard as tungsten
delicate as a moth’s
wing, profound
and cruel
as the bitterness of life. The more I want—

The more I want to hurt you. From you
to my hands, a violent flash of lightning : my
fingers touch your blood outside

time & magic. Nothing is absolute.
Everything

moves {everything
spirals} everything

flies away. Your absence, trembles
in the ticking of a clock. I want to be inside

[your darkest everything]. All of you
in a space full of sounds. You are all
the combinations of numbers
reaching my cells.

I leave you <heart>
like
a
four-poster
bed
leaking something so strong
they can smell it on the street.

I’d like to paint you
but there are no colors.

Behind the art

Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, well-known Mexican painters whose affair led to marriage in 1929. Their lives were marked by Kahlo’s temper and Rivera’s relentless infidelity, although Kahlo also had other lovers. Their turbulent love for each other is evident in the art and letters they left behind.