settle, then, in serpentine
words once heard when
mixing roses and turpentine -
tales spun again in oils
flung on canvas sheets
always stretched too tight.
tonight a frail frame
might break
before colors make pictures.
It's only cheap pine
that holds it all together,
old bones with thin skin
you'd see through were
it not for the layers of
pigmented emulsions of
emotions trying to hide
the white, wordless,
grinning death waiting
underneath