Blinded

Not all snow is bright; by
Wind or whim it transfers
The day into corners of the eye
Where vision ends and blurs,

Where traditionally gods rose,
Altered by the air to dumb
But human mimeos,
To a simulacrum

Of the sky. In the gloom
Where the future is confined,
Distorted leaks assume
The ivory of the blind;

And entire prisms flow
From that pin-point bloom
Of iridescent indigo
Which our pupils groom

And focus, as if the sum
Of icy outdoor floes
Were gathered in chrysanthemum-
And violet-colored snows

And filtered through to us,
Where their rays collide
In the chariot of the oculus,
A kaleidoscopic ride

Where severed photons slide
From stars through glass to mind:
We are the seams where worlds divide
Between the sunlight and the blind,

Excited by the chambered hazes
To coax the spectrum from a star,
To sift galaxies from glazes
And draw nearby points from far.

Bedford
August 14th, 1988

Rancho Santa Fe
November 12th, 2005

Kailua
September 2nd and 11th, 2021