Official Love Story By Linda Gregg

There is a painting by Lucas Cranach

of a thing pink and white and motionless.

Nymph of the Spring. A young woman

stretched out naked against

her red robes which are bundled

behind her head and arm, casually,

to resemble an open rose.

A pair of plump quail in the foreground

echoing her breasts and belly.

A sacred pool with water spilling down

into it from a small cave darkened

like her mystery. She considers

with her young, elegant mind

the sound of the water on water.

Always smiling,

her eyes looking down.

Probably there is the sound of horns.

Everything in the best

German tradition.

The cream of her being.

The world slow with desire.

Passion announced by the shadows

everywhere in the picture.

Soon a perfect prince will come

with shining arms and black hair,

and oriental eyes. He will beg her

for the flower of her body.

She will consider it with her neat mind

which smells of lemon,

the way roses smell. Everybody will clap,

wanting the world to be made

out of passion and grace.

The voices of children will sing sweetly

of Christ in his loss and fear,

sing of the birth after,

sing of the Mystery to come.

From “The Body Electric: 25 Years of America’s Best Poetry from

The American Poetry Review,” edited by Stephen Berg, David Bonanno

and Arthur Vogelsang

(W.W. Norton: 848 pp., $35)