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Botong's 'Camote Diggers'

At the height of his powers he saw the depths

Of suffering: the human form he loved so much—

The glow of skin, the ripple of muscle, the upturned

Chin of his people in soft flourish, like the grace 

Of foliage, the curl of cloud—had entered his eyes,

Nagged his consciousness, as they withered 

And lost his vibrant colors, as he conjured 

Them: Bent and curved like gnarled roots,

Scrounging the earth for a meal, old woman

Digging in the ground, scrawny hands grasping 

A stake, knobby as the cake of dried mud,

The man cupping his palms on the white-fleshed

Precious tuber, as perhaps an infant in the dire 

Straits of famine sucked desperately from a mother’s

Emaciated breasts—an unquenchable thirst,

An insult to the soul. But even his pigments 

Could not sustain the images, fill the emptiness. 

.

The bowed figures dug and dug for nearly nothing. 

Half the canvas was only pale with hunger. 

CamoteDiggers BotongF.png

His ailment had suffocated the artist. His last 

Work was unfinished.

                                       The artist’s widow gave

The painting as gift to the dictator and his wife. 

Then it was unheard of again, though not as

Unheard of as dictator and family, after the people

Had risen, fled into exile. But as things go in his 

Country, the dictator’s family found their way back.

And so did the minions who shared or fed their

Avarice for the beautiful—such as high-priced

Art. Over the decades the Camote Diggers

Showed up in one or two shows, inexplicably,

And vanished again. Then hands—not of poverty—

But of auctioneers, dug it up again. They’re

Putting it up for an initial price not the hunger

Of camote diggers can imagine.

 

 

Marne Kilates

23 June 2019

 

 

POSTSCRIPT: The anonymous new owner of the painting eventually decided to donate the painting to an as yet unnamed museum. —News item. The controversy continues. 

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