Maud Abrantes, by John Riley

Portrait of Maud Abrantes, by Amedeo Modigliani (Italy) 1908

Maud Abrantes

No one has seen deep into her face,
the tilt between a last indication of necessary light
and a tomorrow remaining sightless.

Her eyes, bound in a frame, light nowhere.
If he should try to set a flame there
all we would see is the stare,

no flinch to a rushing fear.
Nothing is there to scurry
her triple hope to lead

the quiet that lets us know time collapsed
between her spark that fails to show
and all her never afters.

John Riley

​John Riley lives in North Carolina with a jerk of a dog named Louie. When he calls him, Louie goes in the other direction. John, not Louie, has published poetry, fiction, and reviews in Smokelong Quarterly, Eclectica, Ekphrastic Review, Banyan Review, and dozens of other journals and anthologies. EXOT Books will publish a volume of 100 of his 100-word prose poems in the fall of 2022.