The notion of a threshold builds a room;
A set takes root in what is playing;
Walls will never hold what the senses consume,
Like printed words exfoliated from their saying.
The world as backdrop, lines retreat;
The painter of the flats has kept
The violent traction of the oblique
As maleficent flights aslant transect
And render the planks’ irresistible depths
In vanishing points that drown the weak.
So scenery now harangues us with invective —
Visual bullying, the other four senses defective,
Flailing, helpless, plummeting into perspective.
Exfoliated – Peeled off.
Flats – Stage scenery on movable wooden frames.
Maleficent – (Pronounced ma-LEF-i-sent) Ominous.
Vanishing Point – A point where painted parallel lines seem to meet when creating the effect of perspective. (The illustration below is from Perspective by Jan Vredeman de Vries, Dover Publications, 1960)
The other four senses – The five senses are sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste.