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Rita Dove
The Late Notebooks of Albrecht Dürer
Every face in Nürnberg is beautiful,
but what makes one lovelier than all the others?
And the body—should the breasts be full or piquant?
How much imperfection forestalls boredom—
could it be measured in degrees?
The winter alleys reek of killed meat.
Inside, warmed inkwell, dry pepper of parchment
and the resinous disclosure of ink,
crosshatchings repeated ever fainter until
they blur, shadows on a baby’s scalp
becoming a parakeet’s nervous
self-admiration.
What is it one admires in a wife?
What was it set the Negress
beyond definition?
For there is no fair person alive on this earth
who could not be fairer.
What follows is a description of how to draw a man
eight heads tall, and it is as follows:
Item: from the skull to the soles is one unit. (The man
is standing with legs apart.)
From the
skull to under the chin is 1/8.
From under the
chin to the end of the forehead is 1/10.
This tenth is
to be divided by two points
Into three equal
fields:
The lowest field
is inhabited by mouth and chin.
In the next the
nose and ears.
In the third the
forehead.
And in the fourth
of the field the head begins
To curve.
A perfectly nice woman enters the room,
offering the saint some words of advice
while the devil blows evil thoughts into his ear
by means of a bellows. The woman
is ordinary and has covered her nakedness.
The saint appears to be sleeping.
Cupid, preoccupied, is trying on stilts.
The daisy is the eye of God.
Laurel is immortality.
Myrtle equals peace and love.
Pansy is Virgin, remembrance & reflection.
Primroses are St. Peter’s keys.
The white rose, purity.
The red, martyrdom.
Yellow, impossible perfection
and papal benediction.
The fig is lust.
The gourd, resurrection.
Carnations sprang up from Mary’s tears
on her way to Calvary,
masked the vinegar stench
with the scent of clove, too sweet
not to sicken
at the sight of a nail
driven into those magical feet.
And this carnation is the flower
of pure love, of marriage and mothers.
And the pomegranate cracks
from the pressure of its own juice,
spilling seed everywhere. And
the columbine waits. And the bluebell
suprises. And the anemone teaches
to forget the bright surface,
to unclench and go down where love leads us.
But beauty is nevertheless created by human beings,
and the judgment therein so doubtful,
that we can find two persons, both
quite beautiful and charming, and yet neither
resembles the other in a single part or portion—
neither in measure nor type. Nor do we understand
which is lovelier, so blind is our comprehension.
Landscape with Dairy Cottage
The appreciation of countryside is reserved for those
not participating in it—i.e., for the observer,
the traveller resting between points.
So if, by quirk, a milkmaid returning
with a basket of eggs stops to
look, it is with embarassment
at being sidetracked from essential chores.
When, however, an entire people
enjoys the landscape in which they exist
& praises it excessively in song & rhyme—
this is highly suspicious
of that taint of character
known as nationalism,
which is nothing more
than the sin of pride transferred
to something outside the individual
over which he or she has no control...
& therefore no right to claim.
“The Late Notebooks of Albrecht Dürer” first appeared
in our Winter 1988 issue and was selected
for inclusion in The Best American Poetry 1989.
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