Look on the Lenses

Look on the Lenses

(“Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’ When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girded his mantle to him (for he had stripped down), and sprang into the sea.” John 21:7)

Look on the lenses of my glasses to
detect the sorrow of my moods,
the eyelashes have transferred the salt of my tears
and spotted my spectacles from the inside out.

What do you do when it seems everyone you know
has forgotten you? Where do you look for the invisible
friends upon the shore? How do you grasp a God
this far from home?

I feel like throwing something against glass,
crashing it into shards, the window, the mirror,
the windshield; something that will break as surely as
the ice pick pits the ground. I feel like smashing the roof
with a sledgehammer,
the sidewalk with a pickax;
but I hold it in and it all comes out in trembling hands,
thunderstorm tears,
aching hips and images appearing in sleep
that haunt my lonely heart for day.

I have no profession to return to,
the boats are owned by others now.
My avocations are solo performances,
a cast of one
for an audience or none.

If someone said she saw you I would run
toward her gaze. I would clothe myself quickly
and beg her to take me to the observatory,
café or public park to find you. I would not
finish this phrase…