Cecilia Gallerani
After Leonardo Da Vinci’s "Lady with an Ermine"
Beautiful, he calls her, as a flower
and wants her with him all ways,
finds gifts to delight her--
French passamenterie for her gown,
the velvet mantle with red-slashed sleeves,
a new viola da mano, perhaps, from Brescia--
confines her lightly as the net
holding the hair to her temples,
sheathing the luster
only he may unbraid.
He is Ludovico Sforza, Il Moro.
Look how she wears him about her neck--
a string of polished jet. And he is called
L’Ermilio, too--see the ermine
she caresses, fierce and priapic,
the strength of her (oversized
you think?) hands. Does she boast
she holds him, owns him, carries
his child? What does she see in the distance?
And why does she look so sad?
Long after the indolent hours of posing,
after Sforza has left her—before the portrait
is dry—to marry Ferrara’s
pale daughther, and after Leonardo
is reassigned to engineer
the nuptial celebrations,
and after the bride has died
in childbirth and Cecilia confides in her letter,
you would not recognize me today,
the painting--long forgotten--
is sent to Cracow, where Delacroix
(who knows pourquoi?) blackens
the background, covering the window
over her shoulder, so we’ll never know
what or who she and Leonardo saw.
First published in The Atlanta Review
and wants her with him all ways,
finds gifts to delight her--
French passamenterie for her gown,
the velvet mantle with red-slashed sleeves,
a new viola da mano, perhaps, from Brescia--
confines her lightly as the net
holding the hair to her temples,
sheathing the luster
only he may unbraid.
He is Ludovico Sforza, Il Moro.
Look how she wears him about her neck--
a string of polished jet. And he is called
L’Ermilio, too--see the ermine
she caresses, fierce and priapic,
the strength of her (oversized
you think?) hands. Does she boast
she holds him, owns him, carries
his child? What does she see in the distance?
And why does she look so sad?
Long after the indolent hours of posing,
after Sforza has left her—before the portrait
is dry—to marry Ferrara’s
pale daughther, and after Leonardo
is reassigned to engineer
the nuptial celebrations,
and after the bride has died
in childbirth and Cecilia confides in her letter,
you would not recognize me today,
the painting--long forgotten--
is sent to Cracow, where Delacroix
(who knows pourquoi?) blackens
the background, covering the window
over her shoulder, so we’ll never know
what or who she and Leonardo saw.
First published in The Atlanta Review