The Garden of Matisse
By Lise Colas

Just a space on a studio wall,
a sway of shapes
against dazzling white,
your bold hands like rakes
combing at seaweed,
shaping colours from light,
lucid patterns of ecstasy
spill into a medusa ballet
chasing the tail of a parakeet
into a stab of pleasure
cut out from pain,
while gestures from your long-distance
brush meander a path
in this obscure floating world
with no shadows cast,
leaving a trail of pomegranates,
like cock boats adrift in an afternoon calm,
and on the last panel but one,
a boudoir in the air described,
where a voluptuous mermaid,
emblem de luxe,
uncoils.