Educating Venus
Jeanette Willert a er Sandro Botticelli ’ s The Birth of Venus
Watch her emerge , winged wind gods blowing her ashore . She ignores a figure offering fine embroidered robe .
Witness her , fresh , stepping out from the filigreed frame , her red goddess hair trailing the wind , no longer balancing aplomb the awkward shell . . Naked and assured , she stands an ecstatic sweep and flow of beauty . She advances into wreathed shadows of laurel , whispered weaving of bulrushes , then turns in farewell to the womb of waves washing ashore .
She is yet to endure rapacious attacks of the Dark Ages , tortures of the Inquisition , chastity chains of Puritan theology , manhandling of patriarchal law . She survives those assaults and others more domestic .
Today , she returns to begin anew . She allows a light blouse to loosen then shiver from her shoulders .