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National Poetry Month, Day #15
Still Life, Interrupted
Why did the artist sign before she finished?
2 min readApr 15, 2025
The olive oil stands in a vessel of leaves,
drawn with care but shy of detail —
like a memory preserved,
not entirely remembered.
A bowl holds fruit:
rounded, tender, unfinished.
A banana arcs like a question —
not quite ripe, not quite explained.
Beside them, a bottle of table wine
imagines an elegant dinner,
the promise of a meal
that never quite happened.
She signed it — why?
Not done, not ruined,
just paused.
A breath held in pencil.
What called her away?
A phone? A knock? A whisper?
Did the light shift too suddenly,
or the mood?
Did someone she loved walk in
and make her forget
she was drawing at all?
