Monet's "Waterlilies"--Robert Hayden
Today as the news from Selma and Saigon
poisons the air like fallout,
I come again to see
the serene, great picture that I love.
Here space and time exist in light
the eye like the eye of faith believes.
The seen, the known
dissolve in iridescence, become
illusive flesh of light
that was not, was, forever is.
O light beheld as through refracting tears.
Here is the aura of that world
each of us has lost.
Here is the shadow of its joy.
___________
Wondering about Monet painting those great figure-eights of color that swirl over the canvas...
Wondering about Monet's vision clouded by cataracts, and Hayden's own poor eyesight...
Wondering about Monet's lily paintings as a response to WWI...and how this intercuts with the first stanza of the poem...
Wondering about prisms and the "light of the world" in Matthew...
Wondering about the rhythmic brushstrokes and the relationship to form in both pieces...
Wondering whether Monet is paving the way for abstract expressionism...
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