The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymous Bosch

At first, the world is given—
a hand, a body, a name.
Water keeps its reflection,
nothing refuses its place.
A man receives a woman,
the air still holds its law.
No edge divides from meaning,
no hunger bends the form.
Then something loosens slightly—
a fruit split wider than hands.
Its sweetness stains the fingers,
will not be set aside.
Bodies begin to wander,
touch becomes its own cause.
A figure enters a hollow fruit,
and does not come back out.
Birds grow larger than reason,
perching inside the scene.
A circle forms from motion,
desire without a center.
No voice calls this to halt,
no boundary answers back.
And slowly—
without announcement—
the light begins to sour,
color thickens toward night.
Objects forget their purpose,
turn inward against the flesh.
A harp is stretched to breaking,
its strings pinned through a body.
A man is scored like music,
notes carved into his back.
A bird with a human face
swallows the living whole,
then lowers them, broken,
into a waiting dark.
A knife stands where speech ended,
a door closes as skin.
The body becomes its prison,
yet will not leave itself.
No exit marks the boundary,
no end completes the act.
What opened without resistance
closes without release.
And still the motion continues—
not joy, not pain, but both.
A garden that will not finish,
a world that cannot close,
where every delight persists
after it should have ended.