Vermilion

BY LINDA PASTAN

Pierre Bonnard would enter

the museum with a tube of paint

in his pocket and a sable brush.

Then violating the sanctity

of one of his own frames

he'd add a stroke of vermilion

to the skin of a flower.

Just so I stopped you

at the door this morning

and licking my index finger, removed

an invisible crumb

from your vermilion mouth. As if

at the ritual moment of departure

I had to show you still belonged to me.

As if revision were

the purest form of love.

Painting by Pierre Bonnard