Eve Writes to Mary Cassatt, by Sharon Tracey

Baby Reaching For an Apple, by Mary Cassatt (USA) 1893

Eve Writes to Mary Cassatt 
​
I know you
will never marry or bear
a child, instead becoming a matron saint
to mother and child, a twist
of fate from the outside in,
witness to the bond and cleave
a thousand times over.

So what if yours
are two-dimensional and cannot be
lifted from the canvas?       Still
they are alive and breathe,
leave evidence
of the endless story,
the holy link.  

Before you left the garden
I might have read your palm, traced
the lifeline from my rib to yours
against the clink of chain
as you unlatched the gate.

Do not the poses and the waiting tell
the tale? The girl slouched in a blue armchair,
a mother about to wash her sleepy child,
the one combing her daughter’s hair,
this baby in her mother's arms reaching
for an apple?

It is cold in my garden
as I write.       I want you 
to know I could have kept
your secrets, could have saved
the letters that you burned.

Sharon Tracey

Sharon Tracey is the author of three books of poetry: Land Marks (Shanti Arts), Chroma: Five Centuries of Women Artists (Shanti Arts), and What I Remember Most is Everything (All Caps Publishing). Her poems have appeared in Terrain.org, Radar Poetry, SWWIM Every Day, and elsewhere. She loves writing ekphrastic poetry. Find some of her work online at sharontracey.com