WHAT THE EYE DOESN’T SEE

Before fake news and photoshop,

we used to say

the camera never lies.

Yet, in this bowl of night,

fish-eyes collect and amplify

the light beyond discernment’s reach.

 

More shades than green meet here

in ribbons, plumes and streaming spikes,

then fade, but flow again.

Their known particulars –

of solar wind, magnetic field and charge released –

expose our partial sight.

 

By boundless silence held,

as underlings, we name the stars.

And do not need to hear,

from yard-thick ice, some muffled creak

to understand

there’s a lake unseen, below.

  iii.2018

  many thanks to Bruno Keiser for the photo

 

WOODWORK

Each day now grows one minute lighter

and the woodpecker climbs a dying trunk,

probes for weaknesses, no time to rest.

 

In creviced bark his chisel bill is sunk,

repeated stabs making splinters fly:

each tree is a door if you use your head.

 

The splash of scarlet unmasks my eye.

Though risen late, I’m clearing wreckage;

each wind-torn pole gets sawn for fire logs.

 

Pause. Look up. Read the pied message.

Its narrow tongue digs insects out, which lurk

unseen, beneath each flake of timber skin.

 

Sunshine, still low-angled, warms our woodwork.

This turning year is none the wiser

that each spent day is one day fewer.

 

i . 2018