by Eve Robillard

Lesson, With Questions 

You (in your very good English)
are explaining to me 
how Matisse did not
paint things—he painted 
the relationship between them.
You point out
to me 
the geranium in its pot 
the goldfish in its bowl 
(your hands quick now, light—as if you 
were holding your own invisible brush) 
and the way apples on a table
mirror the woman's breasts then 
I say to you (in my very bad 
French) I like this one, I like
how the woman stands at the window
the book lying open that way 
the sky so wide
so impossibly blue.

-from when gertrude married alice.   
Parallel Press, 2004