René Magritte, oil on canvas
On the calculous clay, two pennies
stare down a lone dime,
while a matchstick pretends to ignore
the cigarette it once kissed. Someday
the oak wall on which I lean
will warp and shed, splinter
by splinter, long since forgotten
by those who erected it. What is
the point of news, when in the end
all we are left with are scraps
that no one can decode?
I sigh, longing for streams
of stock tickers, Monday-morning trains.
O to escape the tyranny of inaction!
To unlace and take off my feet,
and run to the office bareshoe!