TEMPIS
In the caves there are paintings
thirty thousand years old
and the Sistine Chapel has been
around for a while
In Tibet and Arizona
they paint with colored sand
A Cordon Bleu feast
beautiful for a moment
then brushed away
For those who would judge
one as better than the other
I offer
a poem or a psalm
in a long remembered book
Reading it is in column one
hearing it in column two
Or how about a whispered
“I love you” in the ear
is it gone or is it here
THE STROKE
I lost my father
when he was sixty one
He wasn’t exactly lost
I knew where he was
but he didn’t
Six weeks in a coma
some parts he sent ahead
and some came back
The great Swiss-German
precision driven
driven precision
mind stopped ticking
True the right artistic side
the one he’d put away
the one that mostly died
when his mother died
at eight came out to play
Whatever we hadn’t resolved
and there was plenty
stayed that way
but art is no small
thing either
NEGATIVE SPACE IN NEW YORK CITY
At the Guggenheim
they make a big deal
about the negative space
between the right arm
and the body
of Picasso’s “Woman Ironing”
Which makes sense to me
as a boy from the prairie
Since I have often been told
that there are many
beautiful buildings in this city
And yet have only seen
a few tops and sides
My gaze always glancing
off glass and stone
In its wild rush
to grasp and embrace
any small piece of sky
CHAGALL
Chagall could fly in his paintings
but could not breathe in his house
If they’d had a good therapist
the world might be a poorer place
BOB MUD IN AUSTIN
(World’s longest mud painting on newsprint)
Bob paints in mud
Brush tickles the earth
She needed a laugh
ON THE OTHER HAND
In Haifa
we visited a home
with original paintings by Chagall
(You know how he can always
make you feel like you can fly)
and a bomb shelter
under the stairs
Stopped at a wall by a bus stop
with one stone for each child
killed in the explosion
And looked down on the harbor
across the order the beauty
of the gardens of the Bahai
Looked out across the water
to Lebanon where the last
rockets flew
A HAIKU FOR THE HEALING ARTS
Red art when you’re blue
Van Gogh was a cutter too
still much hope for you
SLEEPING WITH YOURSELF
If you think you have no power
try sleeping with a Kennedy
You may find some, but most likely
they will end up with more
If you want to touch vulnerable
try sleeping with a Marilyn
You may find some, but most likely
you will just pile more dirt on her grave
If you can’t find your inner poet
or the painter unafraid to use red
You can always find one willing
to help you find it in their bed
And there may be value in this trail
however tangled dark and faint
For you can sometimes find out where
something is just by finding where it ain’t
O’KEEFE’S NEW MEXICO
In just this light
in about this place
The cliffs are brighter
because she painted them
MADRID, MARCH 2004
God, Spain again
scraping Guernicas from
walls of trains