Neil Ellman-

The Treachery of Images

(after the painting by René Magritte)

A pipe is a pipe

we think

or not

we think a pipe

is what it is

or not

or something else

but still a pipe

or not

what we think

it is

a pipe

it is

most clearly is

or not

but clearly not

a hand

or face

we think

it’s not.

The Son of Man

(after the painting by René Magritte)

Even with a bowler hat

red tie and overcoat

he is not who you think he is

or anyone, if anyone or what

an ordinary man

behind an apple-face

the son of man, perhaps,

but not of any god

who won’t reveal his face

or say his name

in so many ways

more like a god than son

if god himself

were the son of man

an ordinary man

in a bowler hat.

Golconda

(after the painting by René Magritte)

Repetitive

like rabid bats

in bowler hats

infest this neighborhood

of thought

anonymous

they hover in our ears

and gather in

the alleyways

and passages

in the crevices

of the brain

twenty, thirty, forty

at a time

the same old ways

the same old men

in bowler hats.

Neil Ellman lives and writes in New Jersey (USA).  He has published numerous poems, many of them ekphrastic, in print and online journals throughout the world.  He is particularly attracted to surreal images and has published separate chapbooks devoted to the works of Dalí and Miró.