The Lacemaker, by Charlie Brice

The Lacemaker, by Johannes Vermeer (Netherlands) 1669-1670

​The Lacemaker

Her eyes are in her fingers.
They act as one, bring peace
to her face. She’s the lacemaker,
unaware that her curls
fall carelessly into space,
oblivious to what cushions her work,
deep purples, russets, and reds
that frame her life. Only the task
before her counts, caught here
by Vermeer in an eternal now.

We don’t consider that this 
is really a vanitas painting.
Nor do we contemplate how 
that placid face became 
a pale skeleton, her golden
chemise disintegrated, her
carefully parted hair 
indistinguishable from
the earth that surrounds
her grave.

Charlie Brice

​Charlie Brice won the 2020 Field Guide Poetry Magazine Poetry Contest and placed third in the 2021 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Prize. His chapbook, All the Songs Sung (Angel Flight Press), and his fourth poetry collection, The Broad Grin of Eternity (WordTech Editions) arrived in 2021. His poetry has been nominated twice for the Best of Net Anthology and three times for a Pushcart Prize and has appeared in The Atlanta Review, Chiron Review, The Honest Ulsterman, Ibbetson Street, The Paterson Literary Review, Impspired Magazine, and elsewhere.