Dépucelage

First painting, Mirka Mora, 1947

clouds are not trees are not hills nor a mess

of distant houses;

are not dogs in the yard of the village church

nor the cock on a weathervane

spruiking calm across steep sloping rooves;

are not children at play

by the foliage on a Sunday morning, 11.15am

in Menthon-Saint-Bernard;

not the smooth strokes of Lake Annecy

and not constant red

flattened yellow; not smoke in December

nor a line-up of discreet robes,

and not yet so many windows,

                                           though one has opened