A WALL IN NAPLES AND NOTHING MORE

There is more, there’s the perfect

blue of sky, there’s a window, and hanging

from the sill what could be garments

of green cloth. Or perhaps they’re rugs?

Where is everyone? you ask. Someone

must live in this house, for this wall

surely belongs to a house, why else

would there be washing on a day

of such perfect sky? You assume

that everyone is free to take in

the beach, to leisurely stroll the strand,

weather permitting, to leave shoes

and socks on a towel even here

in a city famous for petty crime.

For Thomas Jones, not the singer

the ladies threw knickers and room keys

at, but the Welsh painter, it was light

unblurring a surface until the light

became the object itself the way

these words or any others can’t.

I’m doing my feeble best to entrance you

without a broad palette of the colors

which can make a thing like nothing

else, make it come alive with the grubby

texture all actual things possess

after the wind and weather batter them

the way all my years battered

my tongue and teeth until whatever

I say comes out sounding inaccurate,

wrong, ugly. Yes, ugly, the way a wall

becomes after whoever was meant

to be kept out or kept in has been

transformed perfectly into the light

and dust that collect constantly

on each object in a living world.