Standing across from you,
our eyes meet in perfect alignment.
Matching height and no slanting angle,
pupil to pupil, iris to iris.
You see to my soul, I to yours.
How is it we came to stand
with such perfect symmetry?
How is it the space between us
contains a chasm so deep?
"The Importance of Symmetry" by Charlie Ritch. Published in Birmingham Arts Journal, Vol. 10, Issue 4 (2014). © Charlie Ritch.Photography credit: Untitled image by Reuters/Jaime Saldarriaga. "A close-up photo taken on March 23, 2011, shows the eyes of a chimpanzee at the Villa Lorena animal refuge center in Cali, Colombia" (originally color).
Engaging poem! But what about the photo? Was that the author's choice or that of the person hosting the blog? The photo really forces an interpretation of the words.
ReplyDeleteThe photo was my choice as the project curator. It was a risky choice, I realize. However, in using this photo I didn't mean to "force an interpretation of the words," but rather enrich the realm of interpretation, to offer the suggestion that the words might illuminate a variety of relationships beyond what might first come to mind.... Thanks for your perspective! --Deep peace, PCD
DeleteComing back around in reading through this wonderful collection, I reread the comment and your response from so long ago. I'm guessing that long-ago commenter assumed the speaker of the poem was human. What if instead the speaker is the being whose photo you used to illustrate it? Or any other thing on earth asking how we humans came to create the chasm and to consider ourselves to be somehow outside of the natural world.
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