Still life: after Ori Gersht’s Big Bang 2006.



As I turned round
I caught from the corner of my eye
a darkened space
illuminated by white roses, as in a Dutch still life of bygone days
a movement from the centre
shattered the scene of pastoral beauty
 of muerte natura
 and all exploded
 shattering every petal and stem
 sending fragments cascading outwards
 in divine trajectory
 and after the dread explosion
 the plague
 of a rain of blood in slow motion down and down and down
 the pieces fell in devastating confetti
 left waiting
 in the black
 one stalk of geranium waving back and forth

 through shards of glass and slowly falling debris.

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