Nature Morte

(Inspired by WHORES IN ART Toulouse Lautrec 1894)

The paintings in the Archbishop’s palace bind the past
to the present as I, Toulouse Lautrec, live on in my art.

Dispossession echoes in narrow alleys; sits legs wide
on the doorstep, black stockings advertise sa chair,

an empty stare, self abnegation of une mère; loss
impregnates the bricks that breathe this air.

Through the French windows’ white shutters I listen
in a central courtyard, cool to the heat of the canicule.
Monsieur Chaumeil, has had his fill.

My brush understands their dreamless existence.
I am the dwarf that vitriolic hearts have disfigured.

Drained to the dregs, by un toubillon she dresses
he gloats, a rapace delectably consuming flesh,

Two Girlfriends, one leans head on the other’s shoulder,
whose mouth muzzles her hair softly, a hand suppresses

the crease of a naked thigh while skirt dangles ragged.
The Alone Body, a lank angel strewn, gagged on a bed.

Wearing chignons at The Medical Inspection, fatiguées
à mort, eyes shut, mouths pierced, exhibit private parts.

Frozen, half dead, a body that haunts: Rosa the Red.
Whores in Art are here. I knock. A migrant girl lets me in.