All Is Vanity after "Basket of Fruits" by Balthasar van der Ast (oil on panel) "Vanitas vanitatum, dixit Ecclesiastes, vanitas vanitatum et omnia vanitas." – Ecclesiastes 1:2 Where the apple turns away the cheek riddled with worm holes we choose to see plenty. Where the housefly tiptoes the pear, determined to coax the sweet from mottled skin. Where the paisley curl of lizard laps the rot, undeterred by dragonfly whir and brush of butterfly wing because there is no stillness in life. Because decline is inexorable. Because the nautilus shell we carry home from the beach is an empty house, an echo of life on the sea floor. Because the fructifying seed also houses decay. Because all is vanity, we invite Death to the table, place the brimming cup in his fist of bones. So we stretch the canvas, load the palette, pick up the brush. So we embrace the tabula rasa, though we still can see imprint of mistakes in the wax. So we become the worm, the fly, the flicking lizard tongue feasting on ruin. So we turn the wheel again, return to ash, return to seed. Originally published with Moon Tide Press, Poet of the Month, February 2020
Unbeautiful no cornflower-blue eyes instead burning embers more suited to kohl than mascara brows arched in perpetual surprise no golden hair that feathers perfectly à la Farrah Fawcett repeatedly tucks the same loose strand behind her right ear Maybelline ads are wasted here. She's not beautiful. self-conscious about the gap in her front teeth maybe she smiles anyway no endless supply of Fair and Lovely Lightening Cream will fade cinnamon skin, bark of some other rare tree dip of waist flaring to fecund curves prized in the tropics, not here in this City of Angels No two-inch thigh gap here. speaks quietly, sotto voce lean in to catch every word pronounced lisp at once child-like and sexy sudden laugh loud as a stack of plates breaking She is no classic beauty, yet haunting in her every imperfection. The world drab without her, this unbeautiful girl. First published in Altadena Poetry Review 2019