La Part du Feu, by Mark Young

La Part du Feu, by Rene Magritte (Belgium). 1947.

La Part du Feu​

In no particular
order, the clues are
a carrot, an egg, &
a glass of some un-
known liquid, vin
or vinegar, it's not
clear. In no particular
order, raindrops keep
falling from the ceil-

ing, a candle halos 
but provides no light — 
though an external 
light source casts a 
compressed shadow 
of the housekeeper on 
to the carpet. In no part-
icular order, Hercule
Poirot, as played by

David Suchet —who 
isn't — is dead, the
housekeeper main-
tains not a vigil but 
a pretense of life 
within the room, hard 
to tell if the egg is 
hard-boiled, easy to 
see the detective isn't.
​
Mark Young

This poem  is from a dedicated website, mark young's Series Magritte :
https://seriesmagritte.blogspot.com/

Mark Young lives in a small town in North Queensland in Australia, & has been publishing poetry for almost sixty years. He is the author of over forty books, primarily text poetry but also including speculative fiction, vispo, & art history. His work has been widely anthologized, & his essays & poetry translated into a number of languages. His most recent books are Ley Lines & bricolage, both from gradient books of Finland, The Chorus of the Sphinxes, from Moria Books in Chicago, & some more strange meteorites, from Meritage & i.e. Press, California / New York. 

Earlier poems from the series have been collected in three print collections — from Series Magritte, More from Series Magritte, & The Chorus of the Sphinxes — all also available as pdf downloads from Moria Books (http://www.moriapoetry.com/ebooks.html).