Marble

Climbing art museum stairs, 
I’m thinking of shoes that scuffed them 
until they curve just so, and you say, 
this is a palace of seeing, right?  

You see a war roiling classrooms  
and exploding in the bullet-pocked  
produce section of markets. We rise 
from a dream of the past, through  

the Italian Renaissance, toward  
the third floor and dreams of a future.  
I want to hush your voice  
when it echoes my dread 

of demagogues and droughts, but then 
I’m snagged by the gaunt cheeks 
of potato farmers and now, in dim 
background, by a servant’s eyes. 

MICHAEL LAUCHLAN

Michael Lauchlan has contributed to many publications, including New England Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, The North American Review, Valparaiso Poetry Review, Sugar House Review, Louisville Review, Poet Lore, Bellingham Review, and Southern Poetry Review. His most recent collection is Trumbull Ave., from WSU Press (2015).