Beyond the Fireplace – A Poem

If you follow the source link in the caption below the image, you’ll discover that this painting was used as a screen in a fireplace. The idea was to make it look like there was another room beyond the hearth.

While I don’t reference the image of the painting in the following poem, I was emotionally struck by the imagery. There are so many phantoms here.

Firstly, this was a trompe l’oeil, which gave the illusion of another room beyond reality of the owner’s actual house. A ghost room. Secondly, the painting is missing two people, whose phantom meal of bread and sausage and wine was suddenly interrupted, judging by the one overturned glass and the misplaced cloth. What was the interruption? Why is one glass full, one empty? When I considered these, the following free verse poem emerged.

Beyond the Fireplace

I dreamed again you were alive
But reduced to a pair of eyes
Watching me, when I spoke
There was no body to hug

I went today to your graveside
To ask the wind again for a sign
That my dreams of you are real
And death is an interruption

©elsp 2025