A Ceiling Bas-Relief

By bosch

Mon, 23 Jul 2018
  • 1076 reads
4 comments
 

              A CEILING BAS-RELIEF

                                                         the Fontaine House                                                                                          

1.     1850.  To typhus, the only boy

        of a tinsmith, lost.  Off to the side

        of the mourning, swinging its

        neck, the child's pet swan rejects

        food, follows its small master.

        The smith resumes work.  Borne

        by river Natchez to Memphis,

        across years he labors, ornamenting

        the homes of the wealthy.

        In 1870, to this house, comes...

 

2.         Atop a scaffold, face uplifted,

            Kneeling.  He applies

            A thin base.  An oval frame

            Molds.  Hands floating,

            The curved outline of wings

            Forms, feather by feather

            Details.  Now,

                                 between the wings,

            Eyes, a delicate nose--

 

            Stare:  the smith's hands

                       long since air,

 

            Lively, this face with his jaw.

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Poem

Comments

Submitted by Parson Thru on

Hi bosch. I love the way you give us the back story, then recreate the fashioning of the image. Like you've managed to get inside the work itself. I promise I'm not falling into a cliché here, but does it need the final line? Perhaps I've missed its significance? I was in Memphis some years ago. Then Delta Lines south to Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

Parson Thru

Submitted by bosch on

Parson:  the last line is what the poem is about:  a tinsmith's son dies, years pass, and now its time to speak to a lifetime sorrow, he undertakes a commission to decorate the ceiling of a wealthy home, and chooses to honor the child, "A boy's face", and between the protecting "swan wings", the boy's ever vigilant pet swan of 1850. and so, the ulrimate use of art, to memorialize and save forever the son he lost, and so well fashioned by the smith that here 100 years later, the image "Still lively, this face with his jaw.."  so well fashioned, still lively. anyway, don't typically go in for explications of my own poems on sites, but this was an important poem that went through 490 pages of manuscript in the process, the current length to 12 pages. you didn't ask for all of this, and so i'll desist. thanks for reading.

Submitted by Parson Thru on

Aaaaah, bosch. Trust me to miss the main point. Sorry for making you explain the meaning. Explaining poems is a bit like explaining jokes. Avoid. Thanks for the explanation.

Parson Thru

Submitted by bosch on

thanks. your obsession against italics to the side, saw where you referenced "Head Frog" in a comment recently. apparently, you do pay attention. thanks.