He stares at nothing while he waits
for another cup of coffee—the waitress
has no idea he’s regretting an em dash
in the first quatrain of his most recent poem,
the one about the time he stood
on a stool next to his mother, his cheek
touching the cool skin of her arm
as she deftly pulls flour into egg yolk, stirs
with her fingers and kneads the dough
then rolls it through the press—
parchment thin—and how it glows when she
holds it up to the window where the red
bougainvillea sway—in nearly the same
manner he walked through the doorway today,
faltering, the moment he remembered how
that same shade of red had matched
the color of his small shoes—
and her lips.
———
“The Poet,” by Gwendolyn Soper. After Lily Prigioniero’s painting by the same title.
Source: The Ekphrastic Review, August 2021
As I read your poem, I felt the colors, sights and feelings flood my mind. Pure bliss, poignancy, and presence.
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