Gregory Minissale
In time the crescent hangs untraced again
chased by the winged quadruped
existence in its wake.
Fire opens up the fists of trees;
forests interdigitate blazing fingers
every tree a hymn
each branch rising.
Your face acquires the very quiddity of vermilion,
as you sink deeper into the warmth of sleep,
breathing in your lover’s breath,
expanding like liquid glass.
And when the travellers have reached the zenith,
poised directly over the nadir of your dreams,
men shall know nothing of this:
the myth lies shattered.
The little ones with bare feet
will play the game of magpies and jackdaws,
circling for the prize of the precious shard
set in the copper sand,
winking its iridescent rainbow-lustre from afar.
February 19, 1995.
Gregory Minissale is Associate Professor of Art History at the University of Auckland and is the author of Rhythm in Art, Psychology and New Materialism (Cambridge University Press, 2021) and The Psychology of Contemporary Art (Cambridge University Press, 2013).