Pretty little heretic, you made it count
when you shucked your taciturn
baby-doll gaze,
tilted your head to the anarchical left
and smiled. Even fettered by farthingale
and satin flounces, you refused to let this be
just another portrait; this one’s the masterpiece,
a fact I sensed when Señora Taylor
flipped on the overhead projector
and Alex Connelly leaned back, propping
his elbow on my desk to see
Las Meninas thrust upon the screen.
Infanta, I knew
from the sly, appraising glitter
of your eye
that you saw me dissolve into
a flurry of moths
when his arm grazed mine:
you placed my secret
like a Tic-Tac on your tongue,
felt the glow
radiate through your tiny body.
O first-period Spanish, theater of pheromones,
site of my most baroque wants: the extravagance
of teenage males in repose, the danger implicit
in the seductive gag of Señora’s Chanel No. 5!
I felt like a cactus continually afire.
And you were witness to the whole melodrama,
ignoring the beautiful morena maids
huddled over you, turning away even
from Velázquez. I wanted to
jump on a jet, march into the Prado,
yank your lovely blond hair
‘til you screamed. But how could I?
You were my confidante, the only one
in that crowded canvas to relish
the vast glimmering deserts
of my adolescent ardor. As Alex
shifted in his seat, I wondered
if I could bear to exist in any world
outside that classroom. Five summers later,
I stand in front of Las Meninas, looking at you.

I’ve spent the last several years trying to forget
a simple high school crush, and somehow
I’ve wound up in Madrid, seeking you out
for an answer. But, Margarita, how small you seem
up close, barely noticeable
in this cathedral of a room! A school group pushes
past, blocking your figure. I could strain,
shove closer, but I drift
through tidal waves of tourists, toward a man
shyly contemplating Los Borrachos. As I watch him
move to the next gallery, I turn back,
asking your permission
to love after devastation – but you’re looking
at the throngs of schoolgirls, fresh lambs
for the slaughter. I know then
I will follow that man
as he wanders from salon
to salon, weaving through corridors
past Zurbarán and Tintoretto, Bosch
and Raphael, out
into the warm Spanish afternoon.