Van Gogh's Bedroom

        —Art Institute of Chicago

--Andrea Potos

Forget the filmed theories, written explications

of motives and compositions; lean

against the wall to take in the life-

sized rooms he longed

to share with Gauguin:

place of unshakeable

repose ... a poet's garden.

Yellow bed, thatched chair, Vincent's words

materializing, dissolving

on a wall of pale ochre.

Fauré's refrain plays

over and over in reverent air.

Close your eyes to sink

into that color he called

pale sulphur yellow, pale golden

yellow—how lovely yellow is! he wrote

to his brother Theo, even against pressing darkness:

There is a sun.