Meditations
on a Page of the Voynich Manuscript
Eight of
them, women of various ages and shapes,
Three above
and five below, in a wooden tub,
Naked, each
one with her hand on her butt,
All looking
to the left, not very happy.
Italian Jewesses
at a mikvah, it has been suggested,
Not some
pornographic image of the stews,
Not Graces dancing
in a Florentine festival,
Yet it seems
they are processing as they soak.
Someone is
bound to understand what they are looking at
Out there
beyond the velum and the ink,
though the
manuscript is indecipherable
and the
drawing is rather crude, a dream in sketches.
And though its
provenance is unknown, it is no joke
To imagine
something mysterious and deep—
If not in
the women themselves or in the aquatic ceremony,
Then perhaps
after all these years, in the fears we sense
In
ourselves, our dread of discovery as naïve fools
Whose role
in the world is to float between life and death.
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