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Velata
- University of Wisconsin Press
- Chapter
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Velata This is what you have missed, love: the Pearl has been named. It is a portrait from life. It is a sitter who knew the painter behind muslin where he stood: Raphael, at the height of his fame. He will be dead by thirty-seven, is engaged to a cardinal’s niece, and every night shades ink pot into eyelash, rose cup to breast, flesh of his wife—his real wife, a baker’s daughter—the colors bright as an egg’s cracked plate. She is half-naked, half-glaze, sheer across her stomach, holding out her breast. For you, I held my body barely in strings. For you, one shift and the white dress fell. Now, at home, heat is a wire strung through cloth. I do these things you have asked of me. I keep you -22- hidden as a wound; every day of your absence, write a letter, sealed in my mouth for you. Myrtle and quince, the secret gathers between them like a blister, capped with blood. Here is his name on a blue sash banding her arm in two: flesh above, flesh below. Here is a bruise, butterfly of your mouth, I bear for you. Is this what you wanted, the background burned, rushes, a well for her head? Is this what men do, make mistresses from wives? His students hurry: scrub the ring off, scrub the ring off, scrub the ring off, scrub the ring— -23- [54.81.185.66] Project MUSE (2024-03-19 03:09 GMT) ...