Painting the Prairie
Tag Archives: Art
Georgia O’Keeffe’s New Mexico
Poet All Stars
First day of the World Series today!
Sagrada Familia
IN ART AS IN LIFE
IN ART AS IN LIFE
There are girls with tattoos
that go to places you cannot see
for clothes, or they without mirrors
There is art stolen by Nazis
that has never been recovered
There are more
openings than you can attend
more miles
in the Louvre, Prada and Hermitage
Here on the fridge, home from grade 2
notice the use of color and light
SAGRADA FAMILIA
SAGRADA FAMILIA
It took Antoni Gaudi to see
that if a tree can be a cathedral
a cathedral can also be a tree
That it still stands is proof
that the branches from its trunks
can hold the canopy of roof
It is trite and true to say
that Gaudi built poetry
and I’d love to build a poem
where one could come and sit
as softly on a hardwood pew
in a place so radiant lit
ALWAYS FOR THE FIRST TIME
ALWAYS FOR THE FIRST TIME
for Andre Breton
Mary Oliver has written another great poem,
That is to be expected you say
she is a great poet after all
It’s only Houdini
getting out of his chains again
no big deal, he is Houdini isn’t he
Oh no my friends
Notwithstanding there might be
a little less effort each time
a little less pain and pushing
at the beginning and the end
a miracle is still a miracle
no matter how often it happens
Take birth for instance
TEMPIS
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
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
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