Icon

I trace the origin of my search

Back to the Romanian artist named Iarcas

Because it was his painting that initiated

My iconographic amazement:

The Virgin’s large round eyes,

Her tilted head and serious face,

Her tall forehead bent forward

Into the light of heaven.

She appeared in my dreams and then

I returned to the gallery to stand before her in awe.

Her face spoke to me in no ordinary way,

I was captive to some potent image beyond the painting itself,

Some magical alchemy worked behind that Madonna,

And I returned week after week to gaze

At the perfect picture with my imperfect eyes

Yearning and yearning in the cool shaft

Of God’s gimmick, man’s obsession over image,

Which is only half-real, the other half—

Lie.

CRA

11/3/2005