MASTERPIECE #3546

/// Famed “Il Bacio” (we’d say “The Kiss”)
has three versions, but they aren’t this.
Here, the sequence of three
is a joke, (seems to me);
Hayez didn’t paint “Man Fleeing Miss.”

/// This scene brought Hayez immortal fame,
but his three versions look much the same.
A white dress once she wears,
or there’s cloth on the stairs,
but the dude’s always kissing the dame.

/// I’m impressed by just how skillfully
someone rendered the sequence we see.
With intention to kid
that first frame Hayez did,
a wit painted a great parody.

/// Other gag versions shouldn’t be missed.
On the internet several exist.
Clever satires abound.
In just one that I found,
it’s by Santa Claus she’s being kissed.

/// We might think that the smooch which he plants
on her kisser smacks just of romance.
Symbolism is there
in the colors they wear;
flags of Italy, back then, and France.