Reverie

Reverie

by Linda Aldrich

oil painting by Jack B. Yeats

Not a gentle daydream

not the peaceful view outside

his train window

an older feverish meaning

from French a roaming

delirium

madness

a raving

flaming wildness

applied with a knife

such thick

explosion

of gold orange alizarin crimson

the cabin is aflame

the man the painter reclines

on a seat head propped

on a hand on a bent elbow

his eyes lost to it

boats buildings faces mouths roses

glyphs of cranes spelling swirling

burning around him from within him

incendiary

he allows himself this

heat

this re-making

the customary world

outside his window

no longer

large enough