MARK DOTY: You can’t look at this picture without imagining the whiff of that cut lemon peel or the beautiful tartness of the slice, as it’s squeezed onto one of those liquid oysters.

NARRATOR: Poet Mark Doty was so gripped by this painting that he wrote an entire book inspired by the encounter.

MARK DOTY: This is, in fact, the first still life that actually drew me in. I looked briefly, as one who really wasn’t all that committed to looking at still lifes, walked away, and then found myself going back, and looked a little longer. I think this happened to me four times, at least, with this picture.

The glass invites that sense of what would it be like to wrap your hand, your fingers, around the base, with a complicated pattern, and lift that cool wine up, smelling the fragrance of it, the taste again. Vision, fragrance, texture, color. And taste.

NARRATOR: The immediacy of the painting and what it evoked stayed with Doty long after he left The Met. Like a poem carefully crafted to convey an abstract emotion in a few words, Doty believes Dutch still lifes have a distinct power. They go beyond representing objects and reverberate with larger meaning.

MARK DOTY: At the time, it was a mystery to me why I kept coming back to this picture. I wanted to sort of daydream my way into those round grapes. And the oysters, too. Everything about it seemed to call me back for another look. As a writer, one is always trying to hold the moment up to the light so it can be seen, really, as long as anybody cares to read it.