THE DISPLAY

Captive, I say, captive--
not the butterflies with their gossamer
wings inside this greenhouse
in the lobby of the hotel
but the eyes that follow them,
watching but not really seeing,
like the great stone eyes of Ozymandias,
king of kings; some can't tell
the difference between the monarchs
mounted on the wall and the ones
that fly through taxidermied air,
through shafts of light, and land
on sponges soaked in honey, or a bouquet
of gardening shears, enclosed by silence.


STILL LIVES

Listen to Snyders and den Uyl; they say
you must live with uncertainty,
change, you must learn patience,
must learn to watch azaleas crumple in their Wan-Li pot,
must watch leaves desiccate and fall--
all things are in perpetual
decline. Watch three sparrows
peck at a vine of rotten strawberries;
watch the remains of your breakfast
rot, the milk congeal in the Venetian goblet
framed by the niche; watch the pulp flake
from the porcelain dish piled high with orange rinds,
the crumbs turn to pebbles on the gold-leaf plate; oh yes,
observe the greasy thumbprints of the waiter.
And the world will open for just a moment,
as though you were waking from some beautiful dream;
you will walk to the piano, sit down,
desultorily strike a key, the weight
of expectations lifted. What is the truth?


VENICE

All by yourself you are the world
that passed with the passing of the Doge--
the insignificant things, the barber's blade
against his cheek, the way the bottom of his ermine robes
grew damp when he walked in the rain,
the smell of grizzle on his plate
congealing among white lumps of fat,
a blot of ink or red wax seal
drying on a letter or a document of state,
flowers that droop and names that wear away....

Again you're in San Marco Square.
Evening is falling.
Stylish couples sip espresso from little china cups
as a jazz band plays and light flakes off the wedding cake Palazzo Ducale
while across the lagoon
the bells of San Giorgio Maggiore toll.