She's Painted a Blue Fish, a Red Apple
Is it a trick or did she forget
the apple's shadow so it rides
at liberty on the back
of a blue fish on a white cloth?
The other apples she painted
strain for reality: round, rounder,
roundest. "We are round and red."
The artist can't flatten
them. They insist on round and redness.
A shadow holds us down,
ties us to earth-without it
we float-What was the story about
der Mann ohne Schatten, the man
without a shadow? Was it a curse to him?
Without a shadow we are nobody-
sun doesn't "read" us
as our eyes won't read
the apple sitting on the cloth
without its shadow.
Don't take my shadow, my Caliban, my Ariel.
The villagers shivered and whispered
when the man without a shadow
passed by. Oh, I pity him alone,
doubly alone.
I draw my shadow around me.
The heart has no shadow. It tries to
preserve itself like a pearl,
nothing must change, exposure
means mockery.
The beginner wants reality:
a round rosy apple, a fish in the water,
drapery that flows like snow
and stiffens like starch.
It is exciting to be real
until a worm eats the apple.
Her brush stroke lays a color
over another color. They stay,
one on top, one on bottom
and the viewer understands tranquillity.
Oh my harried man, take up your shadow-
it is real, illusions are real.
Perspectives collapse into motion;
colors surrender to dark and light.
My father, the magician, his hands
cast ducks and rabbits on the wall.
Carne vale. One day of each year
the world turns upside down.
Shadow be with me at the end
holding me up, my blue fish
swimming in the tablecloth.
Last linens be cool waters.
Structure
51 lines · 8 stanzas