NEXT
PAGE Michael J.
OPPERMAN
DES MOINES ART CENTER, SEPTEMBER
In the museum hall, near the shocking air
around Kiki Smith's Virgin
(bold labia cast in metho-cellulose, shining
glass pupils pushed into a paper head
with no mouth),
past stairs roped off, rooms closed
for renovation, you stand.
On your cheek, the glance
of misplaced makeup. Beyond the corner,
canvas bodies without heads
ranked, wrapped and rewrapped
in glue and more canvas and the order
of memory. Then a mediocre Rothko
with red pouring deeply into white.
We wander toward the end of a horizon
where salt is falling from the sky
back to your studio to drink Turkish coffee
from tiny cups. Tom Waits pulls himself apart
in the background. The time between us
is now lost in the street with all the things
that you and I think we have loved.