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70 lOst pOem reGardinG the musée d’Orsay, rescued by renOir Somewhere in the dark enticements of night that wondrous conceit arrived, some mishap of the past contrasted to a canvas in the special exhibit. By morning, of course, this fine wisp is lost, and not until I am walking in rain do I recall to even try to remember and strain toward two or three pairings so facile, flimsy they’re distasteful. I’m pleased to be out early, returned to the unexpectant grays of Cherbourg, wind loosening knots of hot feeling, unappeased downpour. A woman weighs butter lettuce, radishes, three fistfuls of petit pois in shell. At the boulanger, where the girl, I believe, recognizes me, I pretend to study her wooden racks before choosing Monday’s simple baguette. Back in the flowing streets, my hands pulse with cold, and as I consider the arthritis beginning to stiffen knuckles, glumly consider the future, I get lucky— a rickety filmstrip begins of an old Renoir, stick-thin Quixote in sloppy hat and pointed white beard, the feral eyes, brush wedged into a deformed root once a human hand. Frames click past— handle stabbed into stretched hole of mouth, some startling atrocity of form or light lunged at with a gnarled wrist, brush clamped and parrying again. ...

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