Yard With Lunatics — after Goya

by Jim Redmond

But, there is light… 

but there is also a wall 

that apportions the light 

according to the good 

see of governance— 

…the slow methodology 

of brick and mortar… 

a plain shield 

commissioned 

by this sojourn/spectacle  

of taste— 

impenetrable 

except where it is meant 

to be penetrated— 

the spill of the sun’s 

clockwork over 

a house spider trapped 

under the lid 

of a coin-operated 

telescope, 

a peephole 

the size and placement 

of a paperweight, 

a gag gift 

suspended 

in state-sanctioned
amber. 

There is a law 

that says each citizen 

must be made 

at least vaguely aware 

of their own worst 

purposes. 

There is the idea of man, 

and there is the animal 

certainty of unreason. 

There is a bestiary, 

and there is the curator’s 

voice, just above 

the book like a bullwhip, 

that calls each beast 

according to its sign 

and wonder. 

There is a yard 

with lunatics: 

the players and 

the shadow play, 

a trained face for 

each affliction, 

a posturing of 

the grotesque that 

points the viewer 

back through the fiery 

hoop of self. 

A madness 

collective and 

at its pale middle— 

a fight: 

two naked men form 

a kind of twisted 

Rorschach— 

there is the flesh, 

the image, proper 

and what you 

choose to make of it, 

or what has 

already been chosen 

for you.