for Kathy
(Artist Simone Martini, Sienese painter)
In all the old paintings
The virgin is reading––
No one know what,
When she is disturbed
By an angel with a higher mission,
Beyond books.
She looks up reluctantly,
Still marking the place with her finger.
The angel is impressive,
With red shoes and just
A hint of wing and shine everywhere.
Listening to the measured message
The Virgin bows her head,
Her eyes aslant
Between the angel and the book.
At the Uffizi
We stood
Before a particularly beautiful angel
And a hesitant Sienese Virgin,
We two sometimes woman.
Believing we could ignore
all messages,
Unobliged to wings or words,
We laughed in the vibrant space
Between the two,
somewhere in the angled focus
Of the Virgin's eye.
