- here's something slightly alchemical, from Blackstone's Day-Book (the last chapter of Forth of July):

 4


  
 Ultramarine being the diamond of all colors
 a glazing pigment out of lapis lazuli
 (background painted with dust and clay
 become a lively cornerstone, elect and precious)

  
 applied to the low prison cell, with pale
 moonlight through the barred grill
 over the old bruised boxer's skull
 as he wonders at the releasing angel

  
 obliged to use pure Naples yellow and
 vermilion for the lights upon the nailheads
 of the door (asphaltum from the Dead
 Sea region or American Bottomland)

  
 and directly below the cross in the lower
 left corner stands a dark vessel with
 shroud-like cloth – Bishop Berkeley's
 oily tar and water, or mercurial

  
 salamander vegetating in the fire (sulfur).
 It is the grave of Jesus, where he lay.
 And a pale green shamrock gracefully
 resolves... into a little Indian red or

  
 vermilion and lake, deepened by black.
 You must have observed the difference in
 lustre between silks woven from different-
 colored threads... luce di dentro.  Mark

  
 how that heavy angel moves the stone door
 with downward cross laid over his shoulder.
 And he will walk into stone-shrouded Rome
 and bear – (lilied footpad, Troyes mummer).

      
                            4.20.2000