First Published In 2River View - Autumn 1999

      To Vincent 

     
    I wish he could have seen the fields of Spain,
    the massive blocks of sunflowers,
    their pug-nosed faces upturned toward the sunset;
    more than enough to paint past thirty-seven's gate.
     
    Have you seen yellow ochre past a tender age,
    its vintage kept by shaded, airtight glass
    beyond the pale of early learning years,
    still wet enough to draw the latter rains?
     
    In Holland there are colors known to few
    where pails of silver poured the milk and lime.
    I saw them once and never left behind the taste
    of umber's golden sunburn on my tongue.
     
    I wonder if he listened to his peers,
    which paintings that we'll never chance to view,
    forever buried under yellowed graves,
    and if, perhaps the best were left undone?

    Anne Bryant-Hamon 
    © 1999 
     

 
    Four Cut Sunflowers - Vincent van Gogh
    Paris: August-September, 1887
    (Otterlo, Kröller-Müller Museum)
    F 452, JH 1330 
    Click on Picture for Link to Art Museum
 
 [The Wee Poet Tree]