IS CLYFFORD STILL AT THE MENIL?
“It’s intolerable to be stopped by a frame’s edge”
Cleansed is the word that sifts
the epidermis, pigments rinsing,
freshening. The paint
appears to migrate
in shifts of vast continental shelves
spruced about the canvas.
How much he loved to watch
the clouds of suds
unfasten around the curve
of her ass and fall splat
to the spittering tub.
Far from porcelain, and far
From caulk is where he is now,
perched in such a swank temple,
sniffing the wood oils and pungent living
airs, and the slurs of diminished chirpings
voiced by others trapped in
Unknown nooks, ducked away behind
the brushed steel pots and tottering palms.
Where are the microphones
that chaperone, that tote these vocables
through the precious atmosphere,
Through dusty photons splicing
the ceiling, through laminated firewalls,
through taut plush dens aflame
with revolving monitors,
recording the phosphorescent
figures stalking their way about the teak floors
as if with a purpose?
If you are the man or woman on duty
in this snug little closet (And you’re not…)
Is someone watching you?
Watching them?
We’re only minor characters, no doubt,
though one of them
sidled up beside me and muttered
Insufferable, as if he thought himself King
of an infinite space.
Prompting me to ask if the lush
Colors were misplaced on him.
Colors which are, after all, the other
Prime indicators, if not of a God,
then at the very least
a gawk-toothed tourist, or
better yet, a nosey landlord,
the one looking down
frowningly and a bit too extendedly
at your hastily scribbled check,
and holds it high up to the porchlight – the
audacity!—like a pontiff proferring
his holy frothing goblet—
You’re a week late, he reminds
you, again.
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