[David Rosenthal]

Well-crafted, to be sure, and I also found the repetitions in the second stanza effective. But, in the end, I have to admit the poem didn't do much for me. I don't know the painting, but that shouldn't really matter, right? I get the idea with the couplet, and saw at as Catherine did, and I think the the whole thing serves the point well, I guess I just didn't find it terribly revelatory. I think Catherine is right to suspect the third stanza -- mybe it not only "telescopes" but "telegraphs" too much. If I think of the poem without that quatrain, it seems stronger.

David R.

[Kevin Cutrer]

Perhaps the antecedent of "it" is literally Madame Poupoule's eye, and Lautrec "sets" its discerning, uninterruptable gaze on the mirror? Regarding the painting apart from the poem, the eye does indeed have some real weight to it. I like the conclusion in the couplet, suggesting a psychological depth to the picture that plumbs deeper than the "ranging reds and blues." I also found the second stanza's reptitions effective--the best phrasing in the poem.

[Susan McLean]

Like Catherine, I like the different kinds of "reflection" that are at work in this poem. I love the metaphor of the face as an unbaked boule. I do find the syntax demanding in the third stanza, but I read it as saying that his eye recognizes his own gaze in her gaze, and he does not allow the strong colors around her face to distract the viewer from what is going on in her character. Some paintings are about color and composition; this one, I think, is about psychological insight, satire, and empathy in a complex combination.

Susan

[Dmitri Semenov]

The poem reads as well, if not better, without S1.

Lines

His eye, so good at unseen faults in others

this moment that’s reflected from within.

are so good one wishes an improvement on

and at his own, picks out in her its kin,
then sets it so no flame or aqua smothers

that connects them.

The last two lines are a good conclusion for this sonnet.

The only wish is to replace "see" with something less direct, like "guess."

[Michael Cantor]

This is well written and competently executed, but I'm afraid that it doesn't do anything for me that the painting doesn't do better, doesn't bring a new sense or dimension to what exists. It's a faithful description of the painting - but doesn't reflect the intensity of Lautrec's work (this is one of his less flamboyant paintings, but still the poem seems more subdued) - doesn't create an atmosphere or emotion for me. (In other words, what David Rosenthal said.)

[Quincy Lehr]

Indeed, this poem can be taken as illustrative of both the strengths and weaknesses of the Contemporary American Sonnet. While it's not too cloying about it, the piece is set in another time period (and fair enough on that) around a high-art motif (again, no foul per se). But it tells you not only what the painting is, but what Lautrec is reckoned to do. It states it quite plainly so that there's no ambiguity, and likewise with the couplet, which does what couplets are supposed to do and illustrates why couplets are so dangerous (and not always in a good way).

To put what David R. and others have put another way, I want the painting to lift off the canvas in an ekphrastic poem somehow, rather than remaining something in the Museum of Western Civilization, to touch this time, possibly others, rather than serving as a sort of commemorative plaque or plaque at a museum explaining what's going on.

[Kevin Cutrer]

I think that's a fair assessment, Quincy. I do like some of the finer points of the language in this one, but in the end they don't add up to anything too stunning. I think the problem with this poem is that it tries too hard to recreate the specific visual elements of the painting rather than engage it. The challenge of ekphrastic poetry is to give a clear sense of the visual while using the peculiar gifts of the language medium to take the reader beyond the art object. This one only goes halfway there.