Marilyn at Malibu
In that other country the one we call home
on the faded apricot wall of my study
hangs a great big silver framed portrait
of Marilyn Monroe at Malibu standing
on a terrace drinking champagne out of a slipper
glass, her head thrown back and her white teeth
sparkling in the sunlight that you simply know
was shining though George Barris captured her
in black and white. And you know she hasn’t
long to go and what she is thinking
is anyone’s guess, perhaps a rueful moment
of hidden glee over the night she stepped out
of JFK’s birthday cake or her skirt swirled
round her head when she made Some Like It Hot
or just some moment of madness the kind
you can feel when standing high on the colonnaded
balcony of the Mediterranean palace where
we live now, sipping rosé, eating the white
flesh of a peach and thinking how easily
we are tempted to walk into space towards the sea
Fiona Kidman