111. Three Ways of Seeing It

lost in | the loss of losing

& lost still | yet

in the crack of the light

a vision | pickled by memory

left to wrinkle | but we can

flatten it | we can flatten

it out | just need the time

the effort | or the lack

of trying | and the time

the wearing away | of

well | memory and mission

sometimes | of hope

the cracks in a life | show through

because our lives | fit

within those | cracks

we block out the light to

see more clearly | illumination

has its purpose | the body

a deeper purpose | sight as

a form of blindness | brilliance

 

over by the river | eyes down

and cast out | across the water

we see the water | as a surface

not as a whole | as a barrier

to seeing | not as one of

the veins of the earth pulsing

forth | always moving

in a natural recirculation we see

as water | moving toward

an ocean | we cannot imagine

it ever reaching | inside

the river where we never go

there is water | but mostly

the cold | and movement

a few logy | fish

and they know | they can’t go

much farther | upriver

they know | without knowing

at all | they can never swim

away from the river they swim

 

a virus in the form of locusts

we can never see | swirling with

their beating wings | we can never

feel the beating of | fires burning

so fast | the flames pour themselves

through the woods | grasslands

suburbs | the stands of trees

crashing to their knees | death by

fire | infection | police with 7

bullets into a back | can we ever

praise enough | the Confederates

who killed before | we had the

opportunity to kill | with our own

hands | anyone | anyone at all

whomever we might choose as

a form of righteousness never

justified except | by the way we

know we are the better | people

whoever we are? | the rivers now

are death and blood | and hope