Standing in the presence of great beauty
as portrayed by an artist in great pain
amidst a crowd of visitors,
driven up from the city.

What was his illness
and who were the people
he painted in the public gardens
of Arles?

How curious they are to me,
like the crowds of men and women
that caught Whitman’s attention
on the Brooklyn Ferry

Did any of them suspect
their place in history?
My great grandfather
was in the park in Arles
with Van Gogh.
My great aunt
rode the ferry
with Whitman
from Brooklyn.

Now, we stand in museums
looking at Van Gogh’s paintings
We go to special poetry events
where Whitman is read and discussed.
And somewhere,
young men are sitting in libraries
learning a quote
from Emerson
about
Cicero, Locke, and Bacon,
forgetting that Emerson also
was once a young man
sitting in the library
years before Van Gogh painted
or Whitman wrote.