fine brushwork: january morning with drizzle,
one's shoes aquariums, pupil-dilations, cycling ladies
blossom (do vermeer's girls look like this?), a yellow
in the 17th century's debt, specific hue of green
determining sections of skin, and costly ultramarine
won from lapis lazuli, its luxuriant use, and there, to boot,
the somewhat cumbersome scarf, no hammer
fell on her appearance at my personal auction
of old masters, translucent the wholly leafless trees

Translated by Richard Dove