John L. Severance Fund 1971.136

She stares at me across two thousand years
Asking perhaps if I remember her
If all the rites: the funerary tears,
The preservation, pickling in myrrh,
The artful wrapping up of what remained,
The portrait placed with care upon the sheet,
Had stopped forgetfulness. Her eyes are strained,
As if each visitor she heard repeat
The same refrain--young woman, Antonine,
Unknown--had drained a little more
Of that which made an artist now unseen
Paint her so true. Two thousand years she wore
And yet if I but spoke her name, I'd swear
She'd raise her eyes and life would still be there.