Molly Herman

Poem as parallel Artist Statement : I challenged myself to write a poem that weaves the titles of recent work together in a way that enfolds the time and spirit in which these paintings were made — without explaining, what is essentially a mysterious process that sparks art making anyway.

From a nightly ritual of observing our Yarden ( a communal back lot) from my apartment above…

August Visits

Perched on my windowsill,

glaring down the garden path

I see you traipse, saunter, scattering blooms

to be crushed underfoot.

Sucking on apricots as if fall will never come (let alone winter)

Though bulbous rose hips and peony pods say different.

Through this heat you’ve grown a towering crown of Ivy,

tuned your ear to the mocking Nightengale

‘til I suspect you fancy yourself like Philomela

under a bowing canopy of bamboo.

“Once this was an abandoned lot that turned into Eden”

A tale (ragged as your own) to tell the yard’s sentry:

Magnolia, that singular mammal of the flora world,

the only other to listen, knowingly —

and nod.

— Molly Herman, Brooklyn, NY, 2024