To the Art Gallery

Ode to a Portrait of an Auburn Hair Girl

She’s on the fourth floor,
Between the Romantics and the Realists,
In a circular room she inhabits alone.
An entrance to the west and to the east,
A stone bench in the centre,
Where my daily vigil takes me
To watch her float upon the wall.
The people come and go,
Glancing and passing—
Some walk through without seeing her—
As her eyes illuminate the room,
But I always remain.
Beneath her bosom, dug in the stucco wall,
A label identifies her:
“Portrait of an Auburn Hair Girl,
Unknown Artist, circa 1824.”
She will not age, she will not change,
But I will return forever different.
Her beauty will outlast me and when I’m gone
Another will replace my admiration.
For now, with my remaining time, I stare:
Her hair falling majestically on porcelain shoulders;
Her eyes, two distant stars coaxing me into orbit;
Her skin, I imagine, warm to the touch,
As the hairs on my arms stand and reach towards her; and,
Her mouth, born from a stroke of mastery,
Curves on the canvas, slightly open,
And my mind recycles that same daily thought:
“Oh, if I could will those lips flesh,
Press mine to hers, we could vanish,
And become our desire.”