Monday, February 1, 2016

The Caucasus ...

Do I really give a rat's ass about the caucuses in Iowa, or the regional boundary between Europe and Asia?  Hell, no!  Instead, I'll entertain you with this poem:

Rembrandt, the tenebrous

In the etching's third state
Light slanting down
Is taken for granted.
At the foot of the cross
Soldiers on horseback jostle
A party of burghers
Along with the faithful
(As the Good Book affirms).
In the fourth state,
Figures on the left
Have been smudged
Or burnished out.
Darkness is pulled in
Like a curtain of sacking.
The bad thief is lost.
A wholly different lot soldiers 
Hoards the remainder of light.

3 comments:

  1. The Iowa caucuses are extremely important to the American political process. These important town hall discussions are the earliest heralds of the U.S. Caucasian vote.

    ReplyDelete
  2. How much of that tenebrous light in his paintings is simply dirt and oxidized varnish? The "Night Watch" wasn't originally dark.

    But your poem is awfully good -- and I never say that.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I thought the caucasus was somewhere between Europe and someother place.....boy&howdy....learn something evertery day!

    ReplyDelete

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