'They are far away in time...'

 Here, to celebrate the birthday (in 1839) of Paul Cézanne, is one of his most famous paintings (or rather sets of paintings; there are several versions – this is the one in the Courtauld's collection). And here is the poem R.S. Thomas wrote about it (collected in Between Here and Now, 1981)...

The Card Players

And neither of them has said:
            Your lead.
                        An absence of trumps
will arrest movement.

Knees almost touching,
hands almost touching,
                        they are far away
in time in a world
                         of equations.

                        The pipe without
             smoke, the empty
             bottle, the light
on the wall are the clock
             they will go by.
                                 Only their minds
                                 lazily as flies
                                            drift
round and round the inane
problem their boredom
                            has led them to pose.