Artist leaving residence

The artist leaves the building.
This time he is
wrapping up
his canvases, colors, and
hairy implements.

He loads and stacks,
lines and lays his tiles, some gently
until tightly packed
for transport.

Some of them,
he jams in just seeming
to fill in
any open spaces he sees.

His neighbor, the lady
living below him,
paints furiously-impressionism,
she is no artist.

She tries to finish
her own piece
before he is gone-
before all falls muted,

from above.
Heaven forbid,
the muse is moving on
to another scene, landscape

perch, set of white walls,
half empty canvases,
or another artistic
aesthetic altogether.

Painting by Thomas Prichard Rossiter, 'A Studio Reception, Paris' c. 1841,[CC0], via Wikimedia Commons.

Her yin

The woman saves babies.
I have seen her catch one
in midair with one hand
as it was falling out of
a walmart cart.

The woman I have seen
juggles jobs, hats, dishes,
bills and priorities,
shifting her wide hip weight
when necessary.

The woman stands in front
of her own children, taking bullets
and returning aim, she puts her arm out
when they are driving
still
and says it is reflexive.

The woman always worries,
I have seen her furrowed brow
she has origami secrets folded
up in there,
she uses up more than she has with nothing
left
of self

The woman knows her cliches and expectations,
she recites them easily if you ask,
and somehow
day to day words assemble easily for her,
she may manipulate these into weaponry,
unless she sees
some innocence,
she proposes poisons leaving bodies
awake.

Painting by Bronzino (1540) in [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.