Statue

When did that last
Bright flake fall?
Curling from the marble
Maybe,
or a slow fade,
Powdering or
Dissolving away.
The carved quiet
Bleaching to whiteness.
Flawless to carve.
Marble.

In worship or whimsy
Painted gaudy,
Cartoon colors shone
From plinth and alcove.

To much blood and
Iterative tramp of the
Beaten into slavery
Washed and wore the
Memory away of the
Painted faces,
The gilded robes.
To much blood.

Dust and rubble
Wrack the ruin
All is drowned
And silted deep
In floods of prayers.
Forgotten
in dark abnegation

Mimics,
after their
Unearthing
Saw perfection.
White.
Copy-carved again the
Marble flesh
Digging out
Forms from
blocky stones.
Exposing limb and
Curve of breast
And cheak from
Shrouding stone.
No thought
To dress in paint
With life colors
Their dolorous
Distortions of space.
Self worship.
Attempting some
Impossible perfecting
Of a gamboling posturing
Grinning ape.