Andy Warhol Speaks to His Two Filipina Maids

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Alfred A. Yuson

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Art, my dears, is not cleaning up

after the act.  Neither is it washing off

grime with the soap of tact.  In fact

and in truth, my dears, art is dead

 

center, between meals, amid spices

and spoilage.  Fills up the whitebread

sweep of life's obedient slices.

 

Art is the letters you send home

about the man you serve.  Or the salad

you bring in to my parlor of elites.

While Manhattan stares down at the soup

 

of our affinities.  And we hear talk of coup

in your islands.  There they copy love

the way I do, as how I arrive over and over

 

again at art.  Perhaps too it is the time

marked by the sand in your shoes, spilling

softly like rumor.  After your hearts I lust.

In our God you trust.  And it's your day off.

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Mga Tula (Pilipino) | Poems (English)