March 4: Short Poem, Rita Dove, "In the Museum"

My daughter wants to use my laptop right now, so, out of necessity, I have to choose a short poem from Rita Dove to share tonight.

But a short poem doesn't necessarily mean frivolous or trivial.  There's nothing trivial about anything that Dove writes.  She can take an ordinary experience, like a trip to a museum, and transform it into something sublime.

Saint Marty invites you to enjoy...

In the Museum

by:  Rita Dove

a boy, at most
sixteen.

Besieged by the drums
and flags of youth,
brilliant gravity
and cornucopian stone

retreat.
The Discus Thrower
(reproduction)
stares as he crosses the lobby
and enters
the XIVth century.

I follow him as far
as the room with the blue Madonnas.

Sublime