VIEWING A PAINTING IN A PARIS GALLERY

In the spacious gallery

I spot your painting

from a different time, different place,

shifting with the change.

Viewers carry in

outdoor air, its freshness

somehow entering the frame,

strengthening its colors,

which suddenly dissolve

into pure, flowing light.

I almost hear the painting

murmur, its colors

fleeing voices, as once again

you paint a new journey.

Such marvelous art,

yet thumbing through the catalog

I don’t find your name.

The frame cannot hold your gaze,

giddy at the watercourse,

white poplars, these mounds of hay.

The church melds

with all the world’s clamor,

from our train the station hardly changed.

You turn the mind

to landscape

so flecked with pleasure

it might even know itself.

Paintings need a space

the eye can enter and depart.

Through the gallery’s door, evening light

thins the curtains. I see you then,

in one corner of the canvas,

finishing a sketch:

Sunset Impression.