The first one I'm going to read is called "Masquerade"
and it's an ekphrastic poem, which means a poem based
on a work of visual art.
And this painting is by Max Beckmann,
who was a German who fled Germany in front of the Nazis
and stayed in America and, in fact,
taught at Washington University in St. Louis briefly,
which is where I teach now.
And this was painted in 1948, so right after the war.
It's called Masquerade, and there
are two figures in cat masks and a man and a woman.
"Masquerade, after Beckmann."
We're sitting here quietly.
You're feeling your arm, I'm feeling my face.
We're supposed to stay quiet and live the waiting life.
We were told to be a portraitist's object
and imitate a sad fate.
We are a skull times two.
We're supposed to stay quiet.
Herr Moment is looking at a watch that says now.
Its red face reminds me of the eye of an ogre.
Its shiny rim reminds me of Herr Moment's handcuffs.
I don't want to speak about what can't be fathomed--
mourning and missing, rings cut from corpses, Herr Moments
refusal to show his real face.