 |
| Michelangelo Judith and her Maid with the Head of Holofernes 1508-1512 fresco Sistine Ceiling, Vatican, Rome |
 |
| Polidoro da Caravaggio Judith and her Maid with the Head of Holofernes ca. 1525 drawing Museo del Prado, Madrid |
 |
| Parmigianino Two Decorative Female Figures balancing Amphorae before 1540 drawing Royal Collection, Great Britain |
 |
| Vivant Denon after Parmigianino Woman balancing Amphora ca. 1780 etching Philadelphia Museum of Art |
An Exchange between the Fingers and the Toes
Fingers:
Cramped, you are hardly anything but fidgets.
We, active, differentiate the digits:
Whilst you are merely little toe and big
(Or, in the nursery, some futile pig)
Through vital use as pincers there has come
Distinction of the finger and the thumb;
Lacking a knuckle you have sadly missed
Our meaningful translation to a fist;
And only by the curling of that joint
Could the firm index come to have a point.
You cannot punch or demonstrate or hold
And therefore cannot write or pluck or mould:
Indeed, it seems deficiency in art
Alone would prove you the inferior part.
Toes:
Not so, my friends. Our clumsy innocence
And your deft sin is the main difference
Between the body's near extremities.
Please do not think that we intend to please:
Shut in the dark, we once were free like you.
Though you enslaved us, are you not slaves, too?
Our early balance caused your later guilt,
Erect, of finding out how we were built.
Your murders and discoveries compile
A history of the crime of being agile,
And we it is who save you when you fight
Against the odds: you cannot take to flight.
Despite your fabrications and your cunning,
The deepest instinct is expressed in running.
– John Fuller (1965)
 |
| Anton Maria Zanetti after Parmigianino Woman balancing Urn 1724 chiaroscuro woodcut Royal Collection, Great Britain |
 |
| Anton Maria Zanetti after Parmigianino Woman balancing Urn 1724 chiaroscuro woodcut Royal Collection, Great Britain |
 |
| Arthur Pond after Raphael Woman carrying Jars 1734 etching and chiaroscuro woodcut British Museum |
 |
| Benjamin West after Raphael Water Carrier before 1820 drawing Morgan Library, New York |
 |
| Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres The Spring ca. 1820 oil on canvas Musée d'Orsay, Paris |
 |
| Lucas Vorsterman and Peter Paul Rubens Lot's Daughters fleeing Sodom ca. 1615-20 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
 |
| Giacinto Gimignani Studies of Four Putti (one supporting a Crown) before 1681 drawing British Museum |
 |
| Angelo Marinelli Kneeling Angel ca. 1675-1700 marble Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
 |
| Imperial Porcelain Factory, Russia Inkstand with Cupid supporting Celestial Sphere ca. 1825-30 porcelain Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |
 |
| Anonymous French Artist Cupid with Celestial Globe ca. 1540-45 enamel on copper Hermitage, Saint Petersburg |