Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/arts/your-art-history Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Weekly Poem: ‘Your Art History’ Arts Dec 22, 2008 11:04 AM EST By Jason Gray 1. First Lesson The first thing I ever heard from you Was how to paint the Savior dead. I felt unseated, struck like Mary At the angel’s visitation, And fell in love with your voice. Here Was prophecy: I sensed the words Shook you as much as they shook me. But the foretold means nothing if none Can read what’s on the summer air And what is not: against the dark A flash of fireflies, a speck Of water on the brightest day. 2. Interpretation Here you are the Corinthian Maid, Trying to get your lover into the sun To trace his shadow. Always he must go, Always you stay. How you will learn to love The rock you drew on when he’s gone. Born out of need to keep at least a ghost Of our loves, the history of art is this: The bitter kiss of chalk left on your lips When stone is film plate and adored. Forget the process, love the aftertaste. When Adam left to tend his olives, You were left to bear his image. His knee-high boys with jelly-covered fingers Grasped your skirt and marked their territory. The jelly stains were little hearts all over you. No woman had ever been so loved, you told yourself, And scratched a stick into the ground. 3. Case Study (The Annunciation by Jan van Eyck) Here she stands stained blue And ready to divide Into a copy of God, Who focuses His light Through the window-lens-her name Projected upside-down As if the painter knew Years hence all newlyweds Would be thus joined and sainted. 4. Inspiration Right now you are afield Taking impossible photographs Of a wedding-someone you Once loved, and someone else in white. The invitation plain And on the level; still, you wonder If this is a fiction you’re creating. Look at the image reborn In the chemical bath, the darkness drawn Out of the white, and fixed Forever. Though maybe some time later You’ll find a small square emptied Of its memories, the way her dark Hair loosened from the veil And spilled over the dress, his tie Undone and hanging down His wine-stained shirt-front as they fall Into the car and disappear. Go. The world is nothing But waiting for the light to burn All the images Of what it will be like henceforth, And what it used to be. Like a ring, glinting inside the paper, The twist of silver tells us so. — Jason Gray is the author of “Photographing Eden” (Ohio Univ. Press, 2008), winner of the Hollis Summers Prize, as well as two chapbooks, “How to Paint the Savior Dead” (Kent State UP, 2007) and “Adam & Eve Go to the Zoo” (Dream Horse, 2003). His poems and reviews have appeared in Poetry, the American Poetry Review, Poetry Ireland Review, the Southern Review and elsewhere. He co-edits the online journal, Unsplendid and reviews poetry on his blog, Line Art. Editor’s note: For more poetry, visit the NewsHour’s Poetry Series.
By Jason Gray 1. First Lesson The first thing I ever heard from you Was how to paint the Savior dead. I felt unseated, struck like Mary At the angel’s visitation, And fell in love with your voice. Here Was prophecy: I sensed the words Shook you as much as they shook me. But the foretold means nothing if none Can read what’s on the summer air And what is not: against the dark A flash of fireflies, a speck Of water on the brightest day. 2. Interpretation Here you are the Corinthian Maid, Trying to get your lover into the sun To trace his shadow. Always he must go, Always you stay. How you will learn to love The rock you drew on when he’s gone. Born out of need to keep at least a ghost Of our loves, the history of art is this: The bitter kiss of chalk left on your lips When stone is film plate and adored. Forget the process, love the aftertaste. When Adam left to tend his olives, You were left to bear his image. His knee-high boys with jelly-covered fingers Grasped your skirt and marked their territory. The jelly stains were little hearts all over you. No woman had ever been so loved, you told yourself, And scratched a stick into the ground. 3. Case Study (The Annunciation by Jan van Eyck) Here she stands stained blue And ready to divide Into a copy of God, Who focuses His light Through the window-lens-her name Projected upside-down As if the painter knew Years hence all newlyweds Would be thus joined and sainted. 4. Inspiration Right now you are afield Taking impossible photographs Of a wedding-someone you Once loved, and someone else in white. The invitation plain And on the level; still, you wonder If this is a fiction you’re creating. Look at the image reborn In the chemical bath, the darkness drawn Out of the white, and fixed Forever. Though maybe some time later You’ll find a small square emptied Of its memories, the way her dark Hair loosened from the veil And spilled over the dress, his tie Undone and hanging down His wine-stained shirt-front as they fall Into the car and disappear. Go. The world is nothing But waiting for the light to burn All the images Of what it will be like henceforth, And what it used to be. Like a ring, glinting inside the paper, The twist of silver tells us so. — Jason Gray is the author of “Photographing Eden” (Ohio Univ. Press, 2008), winner of the Hollis Summers Prize, as well as two chapbooks, “How to Paint the Savior Dead” (Kent State UP, 2007) and “Adam & Eve Go to the Zoo” (Dream Horse, 2003). His poems and reviews have appeared in Poetry, the American Poetry Review, Poetry Ireland Review, the Southern Review and elsewhere. He co-edits the online journal, Unsplendid and reviews poetry on his blog, Line Art. Editor’s note: For more poetry, visit the NewsHour’s Poetry Series.