Poet’s Corner: Blessed Art

“The Appeals Court in Boston recently supported Maine’s Governor Paul LePage in his removal and hiding of the history of Maine labor murals from the Labor Department’s waiting room in Augusta. So I’m moved to put a poem here about how we need blessed art in our lives and, especially, in meaningful rooms.” – Henry Braun

BLESSED ART
by Henry Braun

The woman who crouches lovingly
against the wingbone of her harp,
the leglocked cellos
gyroscoping on their pivots
in the fluttery happiness of fame,
the sounds themselves, all, all
body forth their parts
when the conductor’s hands
leapfrog toward one Pythagorean length.

Blessed art!
As in a Giotto
a room’s forms
are made to listen to gold’s
deepest dialogue with light, so
here. Here is a room of restoration
for those who walk away from lost causes
clenching empty hands in their pockets,
for those contorted by the daily round.

As long
as movements sound
their good speed.