The Sleeping

by Lynn Emanuel

I have imagined all this:
In 1940 my parents were in love
And living in the loft on West 10th
Above Mark Rothko who painted cabbage roses
On their bedroom walls the night they got married.

I can guess why he did it.
My mother’s hair was the color of yellow apples
And she wore a velvet hat with her pajamas.

I was not born yet.  I was remote as starlight.
It is hard for me to imagine that
My parents made love in a roomful of roses
And I wasn’t there.

But now I am.  My mother is blushing.
This is the wonderful thing about art.
It can bring back the dead.  It can wake the sleeping
As it might have late that night
When my father and mother made love above Rothko
Who lay in the dark thinking  Roses, Roses, Roses.

-from The Dig and Hotel Fiesta (Illinois Poetry Series)