PAPER CRANE

Banks of the Oise at Auvers 

by Kate Wexell
  • Home
  • Masthead
  • Read
    • Volumes
    • Gallery
  • Submit
  • Resources
  • Blog
  • POETRY COMPETITION
  • ANTHOLOGY
Picture
Banks of the Oise at Auvers, oil on canvas, 1863 
Painted by Charles-Francois Daubigny, French, 1817-1878 
Depicts Auvers-sur-Oise, Ile-de-France, France, Europe 
Currently on display at the St. Louis Art Museum 
Available at the following link: https://www.slam.org/collections/objects/49181/
Banks of the Oise at Auvers 
Trees and water—the world— 
Never looking to the sky but daring to touch it.
Longing—the breath of clouds concealing sunlight--
Pulses through the pastoral air. 

Man and woman—despised— 
Rest in red and gray, money slipping through their
Ragged hands of joy. Breathless, they 
Count their seconds of tranquility. 

Lilies rest above the fishermen’s catch, 
Casting shadows over their afternoon amusement.
Men: they search for something they cannot find. 

Thin—like an emaciated skeleton— 
A beacon stretches up to God, stripped of Foliage
like a beaten traveler bleeding on the road. 

White innocence—the color of a gallant stallion--
Emerges like a pinprick from beside the mountains.
He is pursued by those watching his beauty As he
ebbs away into demise.
And they all continue to look for the skies,
​But find gray instead of blue in their eyes.


Kate Wexell is a sixteen-year-old writer and poet from the St. Louis Metropolitan Area. 

THE PAPER CRANE

​home
read
submit
masthead
resources
blog

Contact us at papercranejournal@gmail.com

Help our cause: donate at paypal.me/papercranejournal

  • Home
  • Masthead
  • Read
    • Volumes
    • Gallery
  • Submit
  • Resources
  • Blog
  • POETRY COMPETITION
  • ANTHOLOGY