Joaquin Sorolla Museum

Joaquín Sorolla Museum, Madrid
(for Katriona Fahey)

Teacher looks too young for motherhood

but is in full command today

of 15 four-to-fives

who have heard her say

“No tocar, no tocar” so many times

the uniformed attendants need only smile

upon her brood, barely beyond milk mew,

too young to be smart,

hand-holding twixt rooms, two-by-two,

their introduction to art

cross-legged on the wooden floors

of the home of Joaquín Sorolla,

the very best painter of beaches.

His mansion, given to the state in 1930,

a leafy respite in the city´s posher reaches,

Calle General Martínez Campos.

Jeans, white belt, blouse, confidence,

she orders her palette of little people

to stare at just one painting in each room,

so much light-on-sand, wet skin,

sunburn, fishwives, sails to assume

into wide unblemished eyes.

In this, the famous one she tries

is of a boy leading a horse after a swim,

foregrounded on the water’s rim.

She asks how can the boy, the horse

be so much bigger than the distant boats?

After a long pause she offers them a word

as though it were ice cream:

“Una palabra muuuuuy larga…

per-spec-ti-va.”

I resist an urge to lift a few of her kinder

kiss their perfect pale cheeks, ruffle thick hair.

Can only wish them sunlit beaches, blue air

full sails, lives lived in per-spec-ti-va.

Later, on General Martínez Campos

the children wait before different lights,

the tall man walking out of their lives

steadily becoming smaller.

Rod Usher