Modeling Poem #2

News

The boldface paper resting

on the ashen Formica table says, “News,”

which is misleading,

since what people want, most of all, is “Olds.”

I was told to please go outside and play, but I find

the old paintings in this wide hallway

too silver cinematic to pass by.

One’s of an acropolis in a craggy desert-

here, I’ll add Heston

coming down the side

with two guns carved from stone,

to interrupt the Jews camped at the base,

eating lox and bagels.

He swings and swings with God’s holy wrath,

spraying blood and capers everywhere,

until they scatter,

forced to wander the desert ‘til Christmas Eve,

when the Christians stay home.

This one’s a classic painting-

an empty sylvan trail opening into a field,

with a cottage beside a stream in the distance.

No one’s in it because

the Communists are coming,

and the stream is infested with cryptosporidium.

Then, a fleet of golden gondolas assaults

from the opposite wall-

Venetian scenes are normally fancy and quite calming,

but these are war gondolas;

full of unhappy taxpayers raising torches and pitchforks,

on their way to the castle to slay Mussolini,

and his monster Fascistein.

Further down the hall,

a Sicilian panorama drifts in browns-

vines clamber up an adobe mission;

clay pots in plenty a sign of bounty.

A solitary woman in mute blue and red carries one of them

along the foreground.

There’s no one else in the scene,

since the men are inside watching the game.

I think if she doesn’t hurry,

the vines will crack the ground beneath her feet,

and ensconce her as well;

earthenware

lifted to God under the bronzing sun for eternity.

On the way back I open a casement and look down

at Shakespeare, trapped in his personal prison garden

of perennials and succulents and iron bars.

It’s the most efficient way

of holding someone indefinitely-

they cut off his arms and legs,

stuck him on a pedestal,

and froze him like Han Solo.

He notices me,

and shouts up,

“Hey! Think you can get me out of here, man? Please?”

but the cafeteria flashes its porchlight.

“Sorry, Bill!

I'll bring you a newspaper tomorrow."