From you have I been absent in the spring,
When proud-pied April, dressed in all his trim,
Hath put a spirit of youth in everything,
That heavy Saturn laughed and leaped with him.
Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell
Of different flowers in odour and in hue,
Could make me any summer’s story tell,
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew:
Nor did I wonder at the lily’s white,
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose;
They were but sweet, but figures of delight
Drawn after you, – you pattern of all those.
    Yet seem’d it winter still, and, you away,
    As with your shadow I with these did play.

~ "Sonnet 98: From you have I been absent in the spring" by William Shakespeare

From You Have I Been Absent in the Spring (Hand with William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 98 and Lover’s Eye)
8 x 6 inches, oil on aluminum panel
©️2026 Fatima Ronquillo

Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white;
Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk;
Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font.
The firefly wakens; waken thou with me.

~ from "The Princess: Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

No flower hath spoken
     Of hope until now!
How welcome this token,
     The green Myrtle bough!
No gift could be better;
     Unless he would write,
Three words in a letter, –
     ‘Expect me to-night.’

~ from "The Myrtle" by Thomas Haynes Bayly

Suitor with Myrtle and Lover’s Eye
12 x 10 inches, oil on aluminum panel
©️2026 Fatima Ronquillo

When he was by, the birds such pleasure took,
That some would sing, some other in their bills
     Would bring him mulberries,
     And ripe-red cherries. 
He fed them with his sight, they him with berries. 
 
 ~ from "Venus and Adonis" by William Shakespeare

Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears;
Yet slower, yet, O faintly, gentle springs:
List to the heavy part the music bears,
Woe weeps out her division, when she sings.
Droop, herbs and flowers,
Fall grief in showers;
Our beauties are not ours:
O, I could still,
Like melting snow upon some craggy hill,
Drop, drop, drop, drop,
Since nature’s pride is, now, a withered daffodil.

 ~ "Echo's Song" by Ben Jonson

Narcissus with Tears and Lover’s Eye
12 x 10 inches, oil on aluminum panel
©️2026 Fatima Ronquillo

To see the rest of the show images and the accompanying poems which inspired them please click here
https://fatimaronquillo.com/2026/03/05/exhibition-temple-of-flora-dorothy-circus-gallery-london-march-30-april-25-2026/

It was a lover and his lass,

   With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino,

That o’er the green cornfield did pass,

   In springtime, the only pretty ring time,

When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;

Sweet lovers love the spring.

~ excerpt from “As You Like It” by William Shakespeare

Oh Rose, you perfect thing beyond compare,
infinitely restrained
and infinitely lavished, oh, head
of a body with far too much wandering sweetness,

nothing is equal to you, oh you supreme essence
of this inconstant hour,
your perfume wanders all about
this space of love we have scarcely entered.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke (translated by David Need)

Profile with Roses
12×10 inches, oil on aluminum panel
©️2026 Fatima Ronquillo

The poppies send up their
orange flares; swaying
in the wind, their congregations
are a levitation

of bright dust, of thin
and lacy leaves.
There isn’t a place
in this world that doesn’t

sooner or later drown
in the indigos of darkness,
but now, for a while,
the roughage

shines like a miracle
as it floats above everything
with its yellow hair.

~ excerpt from "Poppies" by Mary Oliver 

Perhaps the tulip know the fickleness
Of Fortune's smile, for on her stalk's green shaft
She bears a wine cup through the wilderness

~ from Hafez Translated by: Gertrude Bell

Hand with Serpent and Tulips
10×10 inches, oil on aluminum panel
©️2026 Fatima Ronquillo

To see the rest of the show images and the accompanying poems which inspired them please click here.
https://fatimaronquillo.com/2026/03/23/temple-of-flora-dorothy-circus-gallery-london-march-30-april-25-2026-preview-march-28-5-7-pm/

My painting “Clasped Hands with Silk Moths and Lover’s Eye” is gracing the frontispiece and end-pages with the detail of the lover’s eye on the cover of Niccolò Machiavelli’s Clizia published by Mondadori.

I am also very excited to be part of Clin d’œil the upcoming new book by Cécile Poimbœuf-Koizumi and Stephen Ellcock celebrating eye imagery through art history. Stephen Ellcock is a writer, researcher and online curator of imagery via his delightful and must-follow instagram @stephenellcock. The book is available for pre-order now at Chose Commune.

An unexpected collection of over 100 images spanning time and the history of representation, Clin d’œil brings together nearly every variation of that precious organ that allows us to see, to look, to discover — or simply to observe.

Chose Commune

“Hand with Lovers’ Eyes and a Background of Flames”
7×5 inches, oil on panel. private collection.
©2022 Fatima Ronquillo

It has also been awhile since I have posted updates on the website (just been busy painting in the studio). There have been some really lovely interviews and mentions from magazines such as LYF, Beautiful Bizarre, Tatler and Tatler Philippines. Please have a look on my newly updated Press page to read the articles or for a closer look. Thank you as ever for your support of my work and I promise to do a better job of posting updates in future.

Can brown palms and yellow balms cure the planet’s deepest wounds? The caregiver— she who opens a newborn’s eyes and closes the eyes of the dying—remains overwhelmingly female and disproportionately a person of color. Fate casts Asian and Asian American women into a culture of service, entrapping them as designated doulas, named nannies, and overburdened overseas workers—sacrificial figures dissolving self for the sake of family. The gender bias is familiar; the lopsided burden these women are expected to bear not examined enough.
The Brown Palms, Yellow Balms: Reinventing Caregivers of Color exhibition unfolds in ever-expanding circles of caregiving, mirroring the Buddhist Metta practice—beginning with the body as the most intimate site of care and spiraling outward to embrace family, community, collective archetypes, deities, and the environment.
Immerse yourself in depictions of nurturing, nursing, birthing, mothering, mending, comforting, restoring, resuscitating, protecting, soothing, cheering, reclaiming, and empowering—not just the Self, but Society and the Cosmos—all viewed through the lens of AAPI cultural heritage, history, and socio-political landscapes.
Celebrate with us the ancestral wisdom and cultural practices, poultices and potions, talismans and taboos, superstitions and spiritual practices, deities and demons that keep our spirits fierce, shape our bonds, and keep both humanity and the planet afloat.
-O.M. France Viana, Lead Artist & Curator