The Road to Beyond
Shading my eyes
from blazing sun
I gaze as far
as I can see
and just beyond
mercurial safety
no guarantees
mystery
yet, I go on
with valour
Almost Everything Is Unseen
Students
visit the university to see
through
an electron microscope
A
biologist sets samples enlarged a thousand times.
A
3-D image of dirt bacteria appears, soil from sneakers
He
reveals a moth egg, amoeba, barnyard grass
previously
the mundane, now seeds of unseen worlds
“When
you could not see these, did they not exist?
Did
their existence begin under the microscope?
Can
you only believe what you see with your eyes?”
An
eleven-year-old blurts out,
“If
you can only believe what you see
you
almost can’t believe anything.
Almost
everything is unseen.”
The
scientist blinks, closes his eyes and nods.
There are many things you can see
out of the corner of the eye
although at times your brain denies
their existence and reality.
You may say that it’s not looking
and that could be entirely true.
Indirect vision can be
useful in the extreme.
Seeing passing motorcycles on the left,
whizzing balls on the right,
whirling of wings and
twirling of batons can save injury.
When sitting with a child
no more vision periphery.
Central vision, listening ears,
feeling hearts, and you’ll see.
an
unpresuming genesis
cull
tired out t-shirts
or
sheets that will never again
greet
in the deep keep of slumber
slit
with scissors, hold on tight
while
a grandchild in destruction's delight
rips
two-inch fabric strips
roaring
and racing across the room
take
three strips together
loop
the ends together
braid
hand over hand under
forming
a masterpiece of finger momentum
start
coiling this sinuous serpent
sew
off the end, overlap, and beginning again
cut
the last three strips
taper,
sew, and tuck to hide the end
Why
do some believe the only way
to
get the dust of creation out of a rug
is
to beat it relentlessly against
the brutal bark of a tree?
purple
and green
clover
and violets
color
in stone walls
kite
stuck
in
persimmon tree
kitten
too
river
frog croaks
salamander
slithers
I
doze
moving a piano up
to the fourteenth floor
a test of friendship
man
steps around man
on
sidewalk to watch opera
portray
suffering
a
glass, cup and bowl
can
all help to hold back
a
flood in the desert
a
puff on my cheek
from
a desert dust devil
enlivens
me to heat’s white line
rising
on the horizon
reaching
for a far-off gliding hawk
looking
back
the
train moves
out
of sight
with
me craning to see
lost
dreams on the caboose
lurching to-and-fro
prow
dissects grey ocean waves
lifts
bubbling white foam
rises
cool salty fragrance
as
if from some sea flower
Michael Shoemaker is a poet, writer,
and photographer. He is the author of a poetry and photography
collection, Rocky Mountain Reflections (Poets’ Choice, 2023).
Michael is a winner of the California State Poetry Society Prize and is on the
shortlist for The Letter Review Prize for Poetry. His writing has appeared
in Cold Moon Journal, The Compass Literary Magazine, Last Leaves
Literary Magazine, Littoral Magazine, Silver Blade Magazine, WestWard
Quarterly, Valiant Scribe, The Penwood Review, Utah Life Magazine, and
elsewhere. His poems are in anthologies at Central Texas Writers
Society, Poetica, Poetry Pacific, Pure Slush, Bindweed Anthology, Poets’
Choice, Wingless Dreamer and An Inner Circle Writers’ Group
Poetry Anthology. Michael is an editor for the Clayjar Review.
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