The Eyes

By Harry Bauld

Neue Gallery, Self Portraits, June 2019

Most of these Germans
scare the paint out of you, Felix Nussbaum
in the camp, a few bones

in the background and
another figure struggling up
from voiding in a trash can,

the sky dark with its human smoke.
Everyone's looking at you
except Max Beckmann. Otto Dix's

gaze is all Aryan accusation
but you do not confess. And he is
no Nazi. That is just you

soiling yourself. Your daughters
are Jewish. Keep repeating. Lovis Corinth

gives himself in the mirror another
mirror. Does he even have a good side?
Do we any longer?

Kirchner's garish
complementaries look forward—

to what, in that Germany? Always now
it seems we look at art and it looks back

at us on trial. Your daughters
are Jewish. Your gorge rises

against history. You are not getting anywhere
that way, seen and seeing and stuck. Enough.

Can't you take it? The gallery empties you
onto the same hot and sunny avenue

where the president says he can
shoot someone and not lose a vote.