A Hollow Muse

There is a picture of you on my bedroom wall Drawn by my own simpering hand Of your divine features and veiled Oriental eyes Scratched out by the crude tool of a 2B pencil Alas I had no mosaic tiles, nor a sculptor’s clay Else I might have made of you a Leonardo da Vinci portrait But as I am no artist so is this no masterpiece But merely another means by which to profess My bounteous insatiable love for you And all your moods and manifestations Into this simple rendering I poured my heart and soul Sealing my desire on a frail scrap of A3 paper You would scoff at it So accustomed are you to the incomparable beauty of Your living face But it was the best I could do once you withdrew from my life Once your face became something out of bounds A God-sculpted artwork I could no longer stroke Or trace with the tender tips of my passionate fingers It is all I have left of you that I can touch And my accuracy was sorely tested – but I tried Oh how I tried In this humble picture I strove to capture your chiselled cheekbones I copied your masterful brows Your narrow forehead Your hair is full and flowing as in life And, as in life, so your charcoal and paper gaze shifts to the side Evading the eyes of its admirer – me – Dodging the possibility of encountering my wide-open Windows to my soul And the vast reservoir of love that brims to the surface Threatening to spill through my pupils and drown you As in life so in my depiction you are aloof Yes my love I maintained that barrier you erected I sketched it in invisible ink over your supple lips Your pupils, black as pitch The shadowed hollows beneath your cheekbones I remained faithful to the truth of you And what you have become As every artist tries to stay loyal to his model’s essence The lifeblood of his muse So I have not created a false illusion of softness I did not add warmth to your Adonis facade Did not lend pliability to your stern mouth But kept you as solemn and withdrawn as The stunted soulless beauty you are My empty vessel of ebony and crystal My shining icy star... My muse, devoid of love and hope as you are So I have portrayed you, to prove my devotion To prove that my love may overlook all that you lack And still your portrait may be positioned in pride of place So that I may admire your hollow loveliness And give a melancholy sigh for what might have been... If only you were not just a picture A flat one-dimensional etching on the gaudy canvas of my life...