The Fishbowl Fantasy (Edward Goodes)

#56

Through the window, two ladies promenade
Under blue sky in bonnets with white plumes.
This is the room they'll return to at six
When all flowers and reflections fade.
The pointing of the mauve glove assumes
There is significance in the crucifix.
One goldfish appears to be frightened,
The other dull-witted, perhaps just bored.
They are on the edge of being enlightened,
Their faith in something soon to be restored.
For years they've watched the golden doves
Kissing, envied the drooping of their wings.
There is perfection when nothing moves,
When the gold light dies with the evening.

Note: The first lines refer to reflections in the
fishbowl. Click on the image to enlarge it,
which will make the reflected images more
visible.

Golconda (Magritte)

#55

The rain of men is no accident,
Nor this particular universe.
In another there are schools
Of big blondes made of cement,
Each clutching a scaly purse.
The multiverse has so few rules.
Consider the raincoat and bowler,
The antitheses of all things solar.
They multiply in certain states
Like nuclear missiles and hate.
Here they are blessedly frozen
In space, equidistant but fixed.
In another time or dimension,
They might drop like pick-up sticks.

In this world there are no tricks.
Only rain falls, sometimes bombs,
Or the odd, suicidal accountant.
Scientists insist the quantum mix
Is inconceivably random,
Cosmologically inconstant.
(Wait, just like that rain of men!)
J. S. Bach has not just walked
Into this room, whirling a grogger.
All who agree on reality say, "Amen."
The windows have all been caulked,
Whatever rains. Let science augur
Eleven dimensions and uncertainty,
I'll join these gents for a cup of tea.

Time Transfixed (Magritte)

#54

It is seventeen minutes to one.
The candlesticks are all empty
As they've been for all eternity,
Because of a window and a sun.
The mirror reflects the back of things
We see first hand. There is no second.
The train appears as though beckoned,
Flies on smoke and shadow wings.
No fire has ever burned in the fireplace,
No sign of ash, no sooty smudges.
Only the mind fixing this room budges,
Urging us deeper into interior space.
Look away, it's twelve forty-four.
The minute lost is yours no more.

Evening Landscape With Rising Moon (Van Gogh)

#53

Some painters depict. Some painters see.
It is unclear if Van Gogh even wanted us
To view his world of vibrating color
Moving faster than light, his string theory.
Each brushstroke is abstract, fibrous,
A strict, short thread, a measure
As fixed as E in a cosmic equation.
Unclear, because we sense a desperation,
A mania to eject onto space within a frame
A vision too intense for his soul to contain
(Not the insular effusion of the insane).
The painting contains things we can name:
Moon, hills, clouds, sky, hay,
But nothing we can see any other way.

Primavera (Botticelli)

#52

It's Spring and Goddesses are with child:
Queen, handmaidens, sisters, all,
Though one may have been defiled.
Not by Cupid, who gets away with Murder,
His arrows inflicting Lover's Pall.
Nor young Mercury with his caduceus
Resisting threats to the Natural Order.
No, suspicion falls on Zephyrus,
Whose puffed cheeks and pallor
Terrify Flora and draw a flower
From her mouth, in mockery of birth.
Venus looks upon us, the Human Races,
With envy, ignored by oblivious Graces.
Primavera drops dry petals to the Earth.

The Concert Singer (Eakins)

#51
For Renee Fleming

Some singers are made of music,
As though there exists a music gene.
For some, even great artists, it's a trick,
The benefit of exquisite training.
You feel the absence of a votive force.
The notes, even the shaping of line,
Are pleasing, like a poem's off-rhyme,
But talent, not music, is their source.
Some singers make of breath a force
That governs the fluidity of time.
The best understand that beauty is fleeting,
That this song, now, is their only chance,
That perfection knows no repeating,
And thrust at our hearts like a lance.

The Sleeping Venus (Delvaux)

#50

Sleeping Venus does not dream of men.
She is made of love she cannot share,
Love being just another form of flesh
Only memory can touch again and again.
Like the sickle moon, vicious and fair,
She is unimaginably distant light and ash.
Her five handmaidens gyrate and moan,
Beseech the night for clothes of their own.
The well-dressed Madame, Venus' tool,
Mistakes a skeleton for a love-struck fool.
Bleak and meager dreams for a goddess,
Yet how peacefully she seems to sleep.
Though her realm is all stone and distress,
We will now invade her sacred keep.