Marcel Duchamp as Rrose Sélavy

Eros by any other name arrested

distill those androgyne words of love

to spill like ink and ignite and expire

without language to (s)peak of —

that tiresome obsession sits and swells

in those artless pits of metaphored mountains

dwells in alleys dis-ruptured

on a page Miss Sélavy is winking in her furs

wears the coat like a wolf

sinking teeth on a stage

In response to Man Ray's ‘Marcel Duchamp as Rrose Sélavy’ 1920-21.

See the artwork that inspired this poem in the flesh, along with more than 100 of Marcel Duchamp’s world-renowned pieces in ‘The Essential Duchamp’ exhibition at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, 27 April – 11 August 2019.