Belvedere Poems

Uecker

Many people are sad because he's no longer here.
Forty years ago, I watched him on Mr. Belvedere.
He played baseball and was a sportscaster as well.
Uecker became a success, he certainly did not fail.

If you're wondering if Bob was talented, the answer is yes.
It shouldn't come as a surprise to you that he was a success.
Uecker proved to the entire world that he could act.
He helped to make Mr. Belvedere a hit and that's a fact.


[Dedicated to Bob Uecker (1934-2025) who died on January 16, 2025]

The Kiss Footle

his kiss
                   fair bliss

             mosaic
             deltaic

            bronze prints
            warm tints


                   love flowed
                        in gold




15 March 2023

Notes: The Kiss (Lovers) by Gustav Klimt is the most famous Austrian painting and the highlight of the permanent collection at the Upper Belvedere.The painting dates from 1907/08 at the height of Klimt’s “Golden Period” when the artist developed a new technique of combining gold leaf with oils and bronze paint.(photo and info credits to belvedere.com)

A Flashback of Schiele

There is a
Strange quality to my memory of Albertina and 
Leopold's corner at 
mulled wine scented streets I walked
covered with a veil of calmness but 
A few things were somehow not 
the way I wanted them to be there was 
A different kind of energy to 
This lonely endaveour 
I came mostly for Schiele but enchanted by Kokoschka in Belvedere encouraged despite the magic's lack of presence 
To carry on through the coldness of the countless
passages
Only later I discovered 
That the magic never left me

Belvedere

The warm summer had the hood of my car hot to the touch,
the cool night had us tucked in tight,
I don't remember the movie, we had missed too much.

During winter the snow fell down, each other we had clutched,
our smooth skin, even the situation we were in,
we had tried and tried and we had cried so much.

The future remained unclear and though it drew near,
the consequences that we had never given a thought.

The brazen fear, insecurities i swear,
the baggage into the relationship we'd brought.

They had caused us doom, and our love to bloom,
it's not regret or bad memories i'd fought.

It's the perfume in the air, the belvedere,
that reminds me, it was only love that we had sought.

The Kiss of Klimt

I hurried through the halls of Belvedere
To reach the floor where I could see “The Kiss”
The place I’d find his artwork was so near
I finally came upon it, joyous bliss!

It hung there straight before me, glorious sight
I pushed among the people standing there
I felt my spirit rise to wondrous height
With bated breath, transfixed, I stood to stare

How could I trust what eyes told me was true?
There was that gentle kiss, that sweet embrace
I’d seen it often before, but fondness grew
For tenderness Klimt painted on her face

The flowers in her hair, romance in bloom
Protective arms of lover, haven sure
Kaleidoscope of colors banished gloom
A moment captured then that will endure

I gifted to my daughter artist’s book
She loved his “Judith” and his “Tree of Life”
Klimt’s passion women mirrored in each look
He loved them all but none he took for wife

Gustav has left a legacy of love
In paintings that enthrall the heart and mind
Of stature small, but like the gods above
He left eternal mark on all mankind

For Anthony Slausen’s Klimt Contest
November 18, 2017

Adorn

I planted this garden to enjoy.
Photosynthesis comes from the sun.
The white orchids set to the east.
The daffodils are astray.
The roses are a spread on a rack.
The tulips and morning glory are in a flowerbed.
I am relishing nature this year.

I planted these gardens to enjoy.
I sit in my cupola thinking about, therapeutically writing poetry, and reading aloud.
Behind this belvedere are a plot of mustard greens, tomatoes, carrots, and cucumbers.
The radiant energy celestially augments the vegetation.
The foliage is an architectural beautification.

These gardens were planted to enjoy.
No qualms I have, thus far.
I am truly adorned.
____________________|
Penned on May 02, 2014!
What's in your GARDEN? Contest

Drunken Loneliness

Mr. Belvedere Doesn'T Live Here............

Parents are so busy and pre-occupied with their 
own lives,
They never flinch when the doorbell rings twice,
They yell for the children to open the door,
Chastising them forevermore.......
Yet, parents get upset when the children disappear,
When they vanish into thin air,
They blame everyone except themselves
for not doing their due diligence,
If parents really cared they wouldn't
throw their children to the wolves,
Who knows what lurks behind the doors,
Sometimes vagrants, up to no good!
If parents aren't able to handle their tasks
and have responsibilty for the kids,
They should seek a Mr. Belvedere
whose only task would be to bow and scrape,
and opening the doors so the children won't vanish
or escape.

Mannequin Dreams

Falling from forty clouds,
ticking clocks melting time.
Penguins that waddle backwards,
church bells that never chime.

Costume heros reading books,
birds parting their horizon sea.
Rabbit hole adventures haunted,
this evening spent sipping tea. 

Ghosts passing into limestone,
children snickering in silence.
Belvedere on high with royalty,
that command games of violence.

Skyscrapers that penetrate heaven,
wings of angels messengering hope.
Widespread fields are left untilled,
criminals hanging from common rope.

Knives enchanted by prosperity, 
fortresses unbroken in brutal war.
Bronze bodies remain countless,
adding mortar to Poseidon's shore.

Tunnels of thought approaches,
blood seeping through the cracks.
Flesh and bone now disappearing,
from the lifeless city made of wax.

Adieu

My rose unfurled, withered in my eyes,
And thorns endured where dainty petals aught;
On scented breath exhaled beguiling lies,
And morning weeps, unblushed, for love is naught.
Farewell to lusty shadows creaking bed, 
And crackling hearth before which lovers laid,
And belvedere where innocence was bled,
While moonlight specters pranced in flowered glade.
Adieu my rose, forgive my early spring; 
Between my youthful urges lay thee pressed,
And not a single sympathetic string;
Do angels chord within my sorrowed breast.
My garden dampens neath a summer’s rain,
Yet never will I bloom a rose again.

When They Met. Part I.

When Socretes, Plato and Aristotle teamed,
the line between the will to learn married the will to teach.
When Raphael, Leonardo, and Michael lived at Belvedere,
Art would see her form take shape and pave the way for years.
When Beethoven met Mozart on one Vienna spring,
the voice of God was heard through horizontally laid strings.
When Newton, Halley and Hooke looked through the glass and sky,
the universe shed her secrets to be more then meets the eye.
When Thomas, John and Ben picked up the pen to write,
an eagle spread its wings and from an olive branch took flight.
When Samuel Langhorne Clemens met Harriet Beecher Stowe,
the times of change were laid in names from characters' footholds.
When Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill assumed command,
fear and hatred would not be sated on another land.
When Lindbergh and Goddard pushed to see their common goal,
man was ready here and now to soar towards heaven's soul.