Portrait of Madame Monet on Her Deathbed

　　by Mary Rose O'Reilley

　　 Monet confided to his journal， "All the while she was dying， I could not stop painting her face."

　　 -Monet at Vétheuil

　　 He will paint her again as grain；

　　 now she is fog

　　 the chantilly fog of the Seine：

　　 avoiding no hint of the slow dissolve，

　　 the bandage around her jaw，

　　 rigor's cramp at the lip，

　　 how death abraded and hollowed her，

　　 while he remembered light.

　　 Had he a failed heart

　　 or a wholly transfigured eye

　　 that knew her tonight as water

　　 convulsion and sky？

　　 that stared through layers of the body

　　 at more than it took to die？