A Prose Poem

You sit dangerously bent over another pink oil pastel pope. It’s the third one you’ve painted in Rome. The vein along the left side of your neck stands out under the strain of focus. Your cheeks are ablaze with the gold of the papal hat. ‘It’s not a hat,’ you say, ‘it’s a crown.’ Occasionally, you snap your fingers along to what you call the ‘Marcel sound:’ Sade, Simply Red, Sinead O’Connor. You stretch your arms high, and look up along them. Thus, you imitate and examine the posture of the pope on the piece of paper. Sometimes, you exclaim the invented words ‘Jesus Pope,’ because — you explain — that is who you’re making. As you color in the background your torso and the sleeves of your t-shirt are shaking slightly, left and right. Your feet, clad in dirty white tennis socks, hug each other tightly like enamored sock puppets on the tiles of this terracotta floor.