Two Rubens' Paintings at the National Gallery

It's like a mosh pit,
said the girl
with the blue and black tights
observing Perseus,

straddling tens of ham-thighed
soldiers. Holding Medusa's head
at arms-length, eyes averted
as though appalled by her try-hard haircut.

Although long dead, her dread look
still had the zip to stop spears dead
in the freshly cemented grips
of sure-to-fail minions.

Nothing Superman couldn't have done better
with a bubble-gum bouquet of ice-freeze.
Fiends turning slo-mo before they wind to a halt:
the crackle of unwrapping presents.

*

Rubens milks filth
from the bib-heavy maid's
basket of fruit.
No ambiguity here

as the hand of a cad
with a ya-know-ya-would smirk
parts the labia of a clit-stoned fig.
I'm thinking Viz.

Carcasses in the dark:
one way of suggesting
this over-ripe bloke's
penchant for fucking.

The gallery tongues click.
An eight-year-old checking out Constable
with his hands down his pants
announces: wonderful, simply wonderful.