Grateful for their tour <br />of the pharmacy, <br />the first-grade class <br />has drawn these pictures, <br />each self-portrait taped <br />to the window-glass, <br />faces wide to the street, <br />round and available, <br />with parallel lines for hair. <br /> <br />I like this one best: Brian, <br />whose attenuated name <br />fills a quarter of the frame, <br />stretched beside impossible <br />legs descending from the ball <br />of his torso, two long arms <br />springing from that same <br />central sphere. He breathes here, <br /> <br />on his page. It isn’t craft <br />that makes this figure come alive; <br />Brian draws just balls and lines, <br />in wobbly crayon strokes. <br />Why do some marks <br />seem to thrill with life, <br />possess a portion <br />of the nervous energy <br />in their maker’s hand? <br /> <br />That big curve of a smile <br />reaches nearly to the rim <br />of his face; he holds <br />a towering ice cream, <br />brown spheres teetering <br />on their cone, <br />a soda fountain gift <br />half the length of him <br />—as if it were the flag <br /> <br />of his own country held high <br />by the unadorned black line <br />of his arm. Such naked support <br />for so much delight! Artless boy, <br />he’s found a system of beauty: <br />he shows us pleasure <br />and what pleasure resists. <br />The ice cream is delicious. <br />He’s frail beside his relentless standard.<br /><br />Mark Doty<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/brian-age-seven/
