Still Life with Anemones; Room at Arles
Karen Greenbaum-Maya
Originally appeared in the now defunct Psychic Meatloaf
Now tendrils writhe up from the canvas, spill
across the yellow frame in arsenic green,
his telltale color for what wants to fill
and crowd him out until there’s only vines
that halt his brush, then overrun his face.
Too late, now, for the vase’s heavy line.
Bed washstand chair: the doctor’s house at Arles.
There is no way to walk across the room.
Each shabby piece has warped this smallest world.
His eye advises him not to assume,
not to rely on any point of view.
The chair, the bed, the window do not dream
the same great yellow field to hold them all,
and where they don’t agree, the air bleeds out.
He cannot step across. The floorboards fail
to guide him where he never can arrive.
There is no place to be, no way to leave.
Karen Greenbaum-Maya is a retired clinical psychologist, former German major and writer of restaurant reviews, and, a two-time Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee. Her first full sentence was, “Look at the moon!” Poems have appeared in Sow’s Ear Poetry Review, B O D Y, Comstock Poetry Review, Spillway, and, Rappahannock Poetry Review. Collections include The Book of Knots and their Untying (Kelsay Books) and the chapbooks Burrowing Song, Eggs Satori, and, Kafka’s Cat (Kattywompus Press). She co-curates Fourth Sundays, a poetry series in Claremont, California.