Poem

Nina and Vermeer in Dublin

The elongated creaks and groans
of the varnished floor
of the National Gallery,
waxed and polished to their spit-clean
ending as grade school classes,
teenage art students and mid-day
browsers parade past
the painting hung
in the middle of section 40,
a Beit gift,
paid only stolen chance
glances, unadorned, as if to say, ‘Stop
here only if you see the value
in illumination.’

Through left over pall
from the mid-morning
shadow, after overcast days,
her eyes adjust to the painting,
to the tossed items on the white,
gray and charcoal tiles:
the purse, the wax, the seal, the letter.

The key is in her hand,
the seal on the floor.

In the painting the overflowing sun
highlights a view of despair
or air of rebuke,
heart in repair, the lady
and her maid basking in mosaic
of pearl-flecked sunlight, shadow.

The key is below the folded arms,
the letter on the floor.

Through high glazed windows
bright, washed faces, tears,
birth

of clarity: the child
in the painting within
a painting that breathes,
communicates with naked
faith and brushed hope

and where Nina sits cross-legged,
the atrium light tapers and reflects
from her white paper journal
and metallic pen.