Art and Craft 2018: 30

Salome with the Head of John the Baptist

Heavier than it looks. Salver
more humble than the occasion.

What you thought was a longing
wait for praise was only

the headsman asking you
to sign the receipt: behold,

you man. Please tick beside
Promise Kept, rather

than Other. In the sun
you are pale as the bloodless

capital, eyelids nearly
collapsed with the perfect

satisfaction of the death
mask in your hands. As if

you'd found the spell to stop
history employing the blood

of the ones who started it. Or
maybe a realist smirk, to imagine

in that last, bowed moments, waiting
for steel anointment, he knew

exactly what he fucking well did.

after Artemisia Gentileschi, "Salome with the Head of John the Baptist"