Impression, Jardin des Tuileries

I.

One morning in Paris,
		 +++++she alighted
				  ++++++++++on the Orangerie. Hadn’t she, as a girl,
loved Monet?
	++Had each jigsaw of greens
			          +++++++and blues not cohered 	+++into a lily,
had she not let him
			+++++++daub 			+++her vision,
	++had she not longed
	++to disappear 	         into his impression,
			          ++++++++had she not been taken
 			       +++++by the river,
				 +++++freckled
 				    +++++in light,
 			 +++would she have noticed
the museum guards who
 	  ++followed her, the dark woman, across the gallery, as if they might

soon ask, 	  +Where are you from? 	        +Exposed, gradually.

II.

She abandoned the Orangerie to wander
to the Jeu de Paume where Lorna Simpson’s
solo show, her first in Europe, happened
to wait, as might a friend, for her.
In Waterbearer, the figure faces away, wearing only
a white shift, tilts two jugs—one metal, one plastic—of water
for reasons unknown. Into the black background,
she fades as if to discount her position in the composition,
her position as muse. Were she to tell her story, would it be,
even with her strongest muscle, she could not force Monet
to see, as she has, the river? Beneath the photograph,
vinyl letters reflect her memory:

She saw him disappear by the river,
they asked her to tell what happened,
only to discount her memory.

Her souvenir of that morning on the Seine.