[$s ]
I hated who I was so I googled me;
I had a name I was not born with
so I met my partner’s patronymic 50/50
and immediately bulldozed the patriarchy;
o and the jokes available when your name
means money; the names you shouldn’t
name your kids; neither Buck nor Odetta;
I nearly died but I didn’t; I didn’t know
what to do with the surplus so I googled me
and saw that I had published some poetry
but also that I am a homonym; apologies
for the confessional modality; he lives
in NY and is VP of Sotheby’s; shattering
pièces de résistance under the hammer
[sunflower]
pièces de résistance under the hammer
and compressed into venture; into thick air;
instantly immersive and therefore nowhere;
temperature-controlled LED glimmer
and projective worth clicked onto your shirt;
lit with weepy music and ever moving
through the hollow aisles like a credit-portrait
resuscitating the folded-boxstore; proving
entirety; fungible sunflower; interpret
this; baste and twitch; rootless aura raving;
immaterial blossoms smeared to life;
somewhere to be amidst the spectacle;
the mist; to remake the rain; how derivative
to represent that which is acceptable
[bid]
to represent that which is most valuable
we have hired white men with speeding voices;
sensitive to the slightest gesture; who know
where the bidding begins and ends; these choices
define us and the span we have agreed
to be in; yes; I suppose “choices” doesn’t
get exactly at it; when one is freed
from the burdens of value the repercussions
may be less infectious; that said any words
pronounced quickly enough can catch on
can mold what happens next; let the record
show the defendant was in oblivion when
the paddle fell; its mouth dropping open;
and then and only then it was finally then
[handling greatness]
and then and only then it is finally now;
the haptic whorl on a YouTube spondee;
buffering; now the man who somehow
shares my name; poised confidently
on an Alvar Aalto stool; très élégant
in black and white; priceless suit & tie;
the business of doing cost evident
in practiced tone and all-appraising eye;
I’ve watched it for years now; its name
too has changed; The Defining Moment
(née Handling Greatness); quietly reframed
in a brave act of corporate prereparation;
he speaks; rather than try to describe it
I’ve taken the liberty here of transcribing it
I love old masters; I love impressionist
and modern art; I love paintings; but I always
felt the most comfortable in the 19th c;
and the greatest discovery of my career
comes out of that area; over the course
of 35 years at Sotheby’s; out of everything
what stands out in my mind was the Fall
of 1986; and a client called up and said
they had a painting by David; he said it’s called
“Farewell of Telemachus and Eucharis”
from 1818; this was a wonderful love story
that was taken from book seven of Homer’s
Odyssey;
I immediately went
to do research on the painting and found
that we had sold the painting in 1950;
from 1950 to 1986 it had not been seen
by the public; it was really considered lost;
in doing my research on the painting;
I noticed that the definitive book
on David at that time listed that the
1950 sale in NY was of the painting
by David’s student; a woman called Sophie
Rude;
so anybody who would have researched
the painting would have seen that and thought
without question the painting that this man
had is not the original David; in
researching it further; it was clear
that the painting that was sold in 1950
was not the Rude version because of the
signature and dating difference:
the David version was signed on the quiver
and dated on the horn and that was
the difference; I explained to the client
that what he has is the original painting
so it was a discovery and really
made a big splash when it hit the auction
block;
the painting comes in; and not only
is it perfectly genuine: it is
spectacular; It was un-lined; it had
never been cleaned; even the nails were these
old original nails that were the nails
that David had when he stretched the canvas;
it was literally as if it had come
right off David’s easel;
the most exciting
moment was when Andy Warhol came in;
he stared at the painting; and he said
oh my god; I wish I were a painter;
and I said; Andy; you are a painter;
and he sort of just lifted an eyebrow;
I think what he was saying with that one
lift of an eyebrow: you are looking
at a masterpiece; we had estimated
the painting to sell for between 2 and 3
million;
before the sale a woman called
up and said I need to come in because
I’m going to be bidding on the painting
and I need to talk to you;
she then said
I want to have a signal so nobody
knows I’m bidding; she said if I’m holding
my pearls I’ll be bidding on the painting;
so the painting comes up; and she immediately
went like this; she holds her pearls out; I thought
she was going to choke herself; until
the bidding stopped and she was the successful
bidder;
the painting sold for just over
five million dollars; she was a bidder
for the Getty Museum; and that’s where
the painting hangs now;
It’s not the most
expensive painting I ever handled; but
to me it was just; handling greatness
[book VII]
I’ve taken the liberty above to transcribe it
though some of what it says is inaccurate;
for instance one of the two figures depicted
in the painting is absent from the epic;
honestly neither is even mentioned
in Book VII of the Odyssey; mostly
renderings of halls and gardens; Odysseus
spilling his boring [non-beautiful non-
love] story to the Phaeacians; proving his worth;
convincing the locals of his humanity
and seducing them into dazed sympathy;
as for his only son Telemachus
he’s trapped in Book IV with Penelope;
suspicious are we; we who walk the earth
[backstory]
suspicious we are we who trod the ground;
perhaps more so those of us who share a name;
I’m always most suspect of my homophones;
they can be found in any town; they came
to this country with potatoes in their pockets
and took it; I know them well; their sideburns
and sunburns; the clanging tang of their spit;
it’s my job; praise; complain; the world turns
predictable; repeat; someone has to know
what to say when there’s nothing to say;
it’s bad work if you can get it; be thorough;
suspect your own skin; the message it purveys;
go stalk yourself; map the territory;
the story takes place inside another story
[fenelon]
the story takes place inside another story;
Fenelon’s Les Aventures de Télémaque
[1799]; Odyssey spin-off;
last caress betwixt a prince and a nymph;
something you’d pass quickly on your way
to something more gestural; polemical;
something more minimal; terminal;
in a century closer to one’s own;
less ornamental; less retinal; less
dimensional; on the way to a pile
of collected neon fluff; but what the fuck
let’s stop and judge for a while; what is style
but a theory of work and time and time
a break between the seconds you’re not alive
[Meier]
a break between time; barely alive;
five miles or two hours up the 405
from the clinic where you get infused;
if you time it right they shake your blood
to see if you’re going to die; incline
tram; south pavilion gallery S205;
16,000 tons of light and travertine;
the white-cold campus of a serial ego;
good building; bad man; again again;
look for the garish gilded frame containing
the chosen two; strategically exposed
beneath their red-blue-hot chitons; immortal;
the way pictures prove; flushed; revived;
it’s hard to say if it’s saying goodbye
[ἐκφράζειν]
it’s hard to say when one’s saying goodbye;
the boy; let’s face it; has this look in his eye;
he knows he’s got to go; he holds his pike
like a selfie-stick and holds his endless pose;
yellow hair; black eye; he holds her thigh
like an augmented chord and holds her thigh;
the girl’s fingers hold the girl’s fingers
tight; same pink paint as her pink wrap
whose beaded clasps barely clasp; she clasps
his neck; a vise; she smacks her face; collapsed;
it’s sad and settled; the sniffing snout reposed
at the exact slant of horn and arm and cord;
always going; never gone; a standing wave;
it’s pretty cold without a coat in a cave
Ben Doller is the author of multiple books of poems and essays, including Fauxhawk and The Yesterday Project, written with Sandra Doller. He teaches at UC San Diego.
