"Emotional" Evacuation

To one of my age
and traveled
and educated experience,
being a father to 3
and not just a son:
the world need be familiar.

and yet somehow still:
it is strange...
most strange: for example, how

Van Gogh, that ethereal Dutchman
who could so make those canvases glow
with bright, life-infused colors
and exudations of optimism;
He was 'deranged'
so they say...
and somehow in
a shivaaic battle of the art world
his ear was sliced off
by Gaguin...
the brilliant gay painter
adept at portraying God
reflected off tribal island life...

and in his absinthe cups
(for in that age of Europe,
many intellectuals and artists drank absinthe...)
Gaguin apparently sliced off
the ear of Van Goh
and due to political sensitivity...
we've all been telling it wrong
repetitively, for it made a good myth

Is that Van Gogh at the door
at this late hour?
Perhaps he wants
his ear back...

wants for people
to hear the real story.

But cursed to mortal life
as are all we human,
we may not have some things
we want-
even though
we may have some justice
in wanting them

And so:
guided by the rain,
the young and the dead
generally pass on,
awkwardly aware of the impropriety
of their haggled and wild-eyed appearance
in the middle of the city day