after “Saint Rosalie Interceding for the Plague-stricken of Palermo,” by Anthony van Dyck
St. Rosalie stares up at God like a mother skeptical
about his doings. Are you working? she calls,
having made her expectations clear: Relieve us
of this plague. No answer. Will she have to fuss?
Around her, putti clamor, all those bored children
stuck at home now that the schools have been
closed. One holds a skull, dug up from the family
crypt or the back garden. Rosalie feels a hum
of recognition. Beneath her own hectic cheeks
the same dun bone. Can she survive for weeks
like this? Does she have a choice? All around her
the shuttered town, the silent streets, boats anchored
in the harbor. Few are working. The rest fret
at their dwindling supplies, the shrinking of their net
worth, and the unconcern of those in gilded halls,
those in the clouds, from where so little light falls.
Metropolitan Museum 1 -2-3-4-5-6
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