gender gap

art by Beryl Cook

The Poetry Reading, 1982

Beryl Cook (1926-2008) was a popular British painter known for her wry and comical depictions of people enjoying themselves. Here she adds her own Nude on a Leopard Skin to a room where a pre-Zoom era poetry reading is taking place. The desk lamp offers even more eroticism.

Poetry reading minus Nude on a Leopard Skin 

Poetry reading on Zoom,
free and open to all, 
minus Beryl Cook's 
Nude on a Leopard Skin 
(there being no wall), 
the host, five readers 
and forty odd audience,
ready to begin—
aside from me,
women all . . .
     
it happens then, 
a reader notices, says,
say, where are all the men?
You’re right, another says,
so I raise my virtual hand. 
It's a shame, I say, there's  
no Nude on a Leopard Skin  
on this virtual wall,
but aside from that, I,
I for one, am surely a man . . .
     
oh, there you are,
we missed you on the screen. 
Thank you, she says, alan,
reading my name, 
relieved I’ve been seen, 
   I'm certain,
as if I, minus 
Nude on a Leopard Skin,
am all the men . . .

Nude on a Leopard Skin, 1980