2070. THIS PICASSO SPEAKS TWICE

THIS PICASSO

SPEAKS TWICE

How I hold onto nothing at all;

this wizened and demonic figurehead,

all glum and serious, this wasted

federation of all consideration and

sense. I see she sits, hard-backed,

against a pea-green wall. The man

next to her seems better than I seem,

for sure, and he's hers. That's to the

good. More power to him too. Both

figures manage a sensibility I lack.

Double-faced in their cubist domain,

I watch profiles and noses and eyes.

I've grown against all that and am, by

now, well-hurt by what it brings : I

try simply to get over it and then,

by chance, I can't. Those dual faces

facing out, that lightly patterned

shading, that pea-green wall.

This Picasso, I realize,

speaks twice.