Upon Visiting Rembrandthaus

What an honour it feels to sit in your living room,
gazing upon oil paintings that came from your hand,
at etchings where you impressed your mark
on history, captured a port at its zenith,
seventeenth century, what a feast left behind.

Each floor reached by a winding wooden staircase
is packed with you, and I imagine the intensity,
the dark and light of everyday life
you endeavoured to capture, and did so successfully,
most of the time, the whirr and creak of your press.

The steadily carved certainty, steady hand
which cut out a landscape which no longer exists,
captured it in its simple innocence, modest
houses dotting the horizon in pleasant forms,
nature and man gently complementing each other.

As I head for the exit, I'm in a state of such awe
that as I open the front door I realise I've left
my rucksack in the locker, passport and all,
the Dutch master made me forget myself completely,
forced to sell his dear press to stave off poverty.