Due to limited control of our formatting on posts, the formatting of the following poem is incorrect.
I noticed it
(myself)
when I couldn’t find it
I went to there to align
myself
with nature
the sibilance of my breathing
the water tumbling over itself
the smell of dirt and water
and the memory of wind
careful of
where to place
my eyes
I searched for the sublime
in the stone
coming up for breath
in the middle of the stream
in the –
it wasn’t May yet
the only colours I could
find
pale green
and brown
but it kept forcing itself into my periphery
I refused to see it
the sleeping mudbank
dirt for flesh and dry grass for fur
a Coca-Cola can lodged in its hide
dusty grey tarpaulin like a fin in the sand.
I wasn’t demanding the river to
revise itself
but I sat there
willing
all the seeds of the earth to grow at once
spell out some revelation
the trees were swollen pink with rain and the riverwater was not silver.
dull brown with rippling welts of reflected light
I don’t want to see
ugliness wedged into the earth
(myself)
someone once said that there was no difference
between looking at art
or away from it,
but my contacts have dried out from staring