Reddit reviews Bellocq's Ophelia: Poems

There's a very excellent book of poetry about this series of photographs called Bellocq's Ophelia. One even focuses on this picture in particular.

If you're curious what poetry can do in today's world, check this one out for sure.

EDIT: I dug out my copy. Here's the poem in question:

Photograph of a Bawd Drinking Raleigh Rye

--E.J Bellocq, circa 1912

The glass in her hand is the only thing moving-
too fast for the camera-- caught in the blur of motion.

She raises it toasting, perhaps, the viewer you become
taking her in-- your eyes starting low, at her feet,

and following those striped stockings up like roads,
traveling the length of her calves and thighs. Up then,

to the fringed scarf draping her breasts, the heart
locket, her bare shoulder and the patch of dark hair

beneath her arm, the round innocence of her cheeks
and Gibson-girl hair. Then over to the trinkets on the table

beside her: a clock, tiny feather-backed rocking chairs
poised to move with the slightest wind or breath;

the ebony statuette of a woman, her arms stretched above
her head. Even the bottle of rye is a woman's slender torso

and round hips. On the wall behind her, the image again--
women in paintings, in photographs, carved in relief

on an oval plane. And there, on the surface of it all, a thumb-
print--perhaps yours? It's easy to see this is all about desire,

how it recurs--each time you look, it's the same moment,
the hands of the clock still locked at high noon.

by Natasha Trethewey

https://www.amazon.com/Bellocqs-Ophelia-Poems-Natasha-Trethewey/dp/1555973590/ref=sr_1_6?keywords=natasha+tretheway&qid=1554327076&s=gateway&sr=8-6