She Sits in Beauty

She Sits in Beauty

She sits, sipping at a steaming mug with perfectly pursed lips
In beauty so complete that it surely must be stolen
From a painting in an old master gallery.
Around her, the caf? bustle seems trivial - the background is
wanting.
I wonder if she would seem half so flawless
Against a lake with heather banks and sunlit beach,
Amongst a hundred other lovelies.
I wish I could wipe clean her face and see underneath
The makeup that she doesn't really need; the red-stained mouth,
The laden eyelids, the tinted cheeks,
And take that cigarette from between her manicured fingers,
Remove that cheap string of foreign beads from her delicate
throat&;#8230;
I would almost dare to ask to see her, paint her, naked,
But I am just a man, and I cannot approach -
This work of art would not acknowledge me.