“In Our Masked Faces”

After Alfredo Arreguín’s “Cholula”

The faces, all the same, almost black and white,
rubber-stamped generic humans. But wait,
stand closer, look again, ask questions.
Why are some heads upside down?
Rebels, iconoclastic skulls, scattered
throughout the crowd. And not just one or two
but enough to mount an insurrection.
Museum guards abhor such misbehavior
in the gallery. These go-against-the-grain skulls
might wield pens, not the recommended pencils.

Is it a function of my brain that it registers
the upright faces first, only later takes in,
extracts uniqueness from geometric shapes?
Differences in eyes, their color and contour,
open or winking as if to say “we are the keepers
of secrets.” More regularity in noses than in eyes
and though this painting is more subdued than
Arreguín’s brightly colored sister piece, this one
draws me in. No easy answers here. Just more
to see the longer that you look. Don’t move along.

Stay here. Enter the labyrinth of lines.
See how emotions percolate between them.
upper quadrant (your heart
resides in one) periodic blue diamonds.
They look like flowers. Moods pulsate
through the faces and the waves
of blue. Let’s call this work “Humankind,”
a tale of people wearing masks, no different
from every other city in the world. In our
masked hiding, we reveal what matters most.

September 2022