Robert Hayden's "Monet's Waterlilies"

Today, on our first day of class, in honor of Martin Luther King Day, we will discuss Robert Hayden's "Monet's Waterlilies." 

Claude Monet, Reflections of Clouds on the Water Lily Pond
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Robert Hayden
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Monet's Waterlilies


Today as the news from Selma and Saigon
poisons the air like fallout,
I come again to see
the serene, great picture that I love.

Here space and time exist in light
the eye like the eye of faith believes.
The seen, the known
dissolve in iridescence, become
illusive flesh of light
that was not, was, forever is.

O light beheld as through refracting tears.
Here is the aura of that world
each of us has lost.
Here is the shadow of its joy.

--Robert Hayden


Museum of Modern Art site that explores Claude Monet's "Waterlilies"