They twirl and spin,
laughing, the almond trees
in blossom, her little one
humming a tune from Warsaw.
Both stop short
when the coughing starts,
Sand anxious as a new mother,
taking his measure.
She pours his chocolate.
Listens, enthralled,
while he tinkers,
sorcerer sounding the keys
for a storm, a cloud
on fire, a mist
in the willows dotting
the Mazovian plain.
Venus piercing the gray light
shrouding Paris,
Sand takes his hand,
holds his palm
against her cheek–
as if to think away
the grave, supply the one
safe harbor. Delacroix
will paint them
as a couple, the double
portrait fated to be cut
in two, hang apart.