POET JACK FOLEY SAYS, “WE’RE NOT WRITING FOR ETERNITY”

but Renaissance artist Luca Signorelli*
          painted the human body climbing into eternity
                      in the Duomo in Orvieto
First as skeletons, then fully embodied
                      as muscular young men and women

Nude, they push themselves out
                      from a neutral white ground
as if they are coming out
                      of hard ice, rather than earth
A few, still skeletons
          have yet to regrow their flesh
It’s a hard labor, this rebirthing
                      as two angels blast their horns above

Look at that beautiful, long-haired young man
          exerting himself like a mountain climber
                      all but one leg out of the smooth white earth
That final push will pump
          his arm and shoulder muscles, chest muscles
                      and those on that crossed front leg
His head and eyes are raised upward
          already contemplating
                              an unseen God

Look at that woman, her breasts
          almost out of the “ice”
She has to be pulled through by a bending companion
          who grasps her joined wrists
Look at that man standing proudly
          hands on his hips
                      reveling in his resurrected flesh

That dammed Christian body
          that shamed Adam and Eve
                      have no place in
Signorelli’s glorification
                      of nudity and physicality

We’ve had a rebirth here
          We’re had a Renaissance
                      We’ve had a peek at eternity
conceived by a tall, fair-haired painter
          dressed in elegant black garb and cap
                      who painted himself in another fresco
Signorelli’s eternity
          is inhabited by muscular, idealized models
                      who must have held their difficult poses
                              for hours
while the artist sketched them
          They probably rubbed their limbs with oil
                      to soothe their aching bodies afterwards

In heaven, though, they are blessed
          No aching muscles
They gather in groups after their long climb
                    slender, muscular beauties
Heads thrown back in ecstatic contemplation
          And we, too, tourists in this
                    chapel in Orvieto
          throw our heads back
                    to gaze at eternity
to gaze at the inconceivable
                    only to marvel
                    at this very human flesh