The Museum

Encompassed by acres of ragtag nature--
Irreproducible uncaged chaos--
Alien tombs enshrine the Art
Of a most industrial ilk.
Laylighted boxes of purest austerity,
Cubes of smooth concrete and smudgeproof glass,
“Elemental,” they say,
Meaning artificial.
Inside: sterility.
Outside: beauty.
The bleary visitor who has had her fill
Of rusty girders and welded wares
Turns her attention to the panes
Through which--like magnanimous canvases--
She surveys a wide-mouthed panorama
With every trivial detail intact;
She notes the presence of a skink.
Inside: imbecility.
Outside, one sees
The meadow's on uncontrolled yellow fire,
It crackles with goldenrods, tickseeds, vetches,
Hawkweeds, sneezeweeds, and common tansies.
Up in the woods where "rooms" have been carved
To showcase the weightier, girthier thuds,
One may pause to listen to living birdsong,
Not prerecorded;
One may stoop to examine some colorful fungus,
Or admire the texture of tulip tree bark,
Or actually touch a stick or a stone.
(An ACTUAL stick, a NATIVE stone,
In situ, not mounted or situated,
And never "the artist's reconception.")
But even out here, things are slightly awry;
The natural flow has been interrupted:
A lump of hardware lurks in the thicket,
A stark white pylon juts from the rise,
And what's that looming ahead? A head?
A cartoon dog cloaked in garden flowers?
Preposterous!

Reviews

[Ken e Bujold]

Very impressive piece of poetry. Love the way the work weaves seamlessly in and out of the observer, observed

certainly be back to read more of work Wilyem

Ken e