inches off the ground and finds her mother
saying go to sleep; it almost wakes her-
a quarter turn, worry in the forehead,
and then the steady breathing.
No one thinks it odd she's outdoors naked,
and once again the streets are full of dimes,
and when the neighbor boy starts up the mower,
she can't see where she's going in the dark,
no one will help her, and something huge
chases her along a brick wall
panting. She fights for breath,
flops over, blinks at daylight.
The warmth of arms is my reward
for the gallantry of only
being there.
Jay Grover-Rogoff
REDON DISCOVERS COLOR
On a day blazing with spring,
when Monet's canvas slowly would ignite,
or in the heart of summer, when Seurat
discerned the molecules of massive humans
and set down each, or when, on days like this,
Pissarro nudged the sky toward beige and mauve,
Redon, instead, would set down what he saw.
Intricate networks, shadings, organisms,
all black as nerves, would monstrously evolve .
Examining under the mind's microscope
the organs, cells, and nuclei of a spider
that strode toward him grotesquely smiling,
of a chimera swimming like a shrimp
with the face of one's consumptive younger brother,
